Chorale Press Release

In 2011 Actors Touring Company brought together acclaimed director Simon Usher and actor Jack Tarlton to create a new piece based on the prose and poems of Sam Shepard. Along with the musician Ben Kritikos of the band Herons! they presented a scratch performance of Making the Sound of Loneliness at the Arcola theatre. It was subsequently commissioned by Latitude Festival and previewed there in summer 2012. ("Evocatively conjures up all those endless highways, motels and empty badlands that dominate Shepard?s work." Jonathan Lovett, The Stage)

Presence Theatre are now presenting the material under the new title The Animal (You), as well as staging two further pieces by Sam Shepard, the visceral early play The Holy Ghostly and the poetic monologue The War in Heaven and a screening of the rarely seen film version of Savage/Love, directed by Academy Award winning director Shirley Clarke. The workshop will focus on another little seen film by Clarke, Tongues. As The War In Heaven was co-written with actor Joseph Chaikin who was left with Aphasia, there will be additional workshops and outreach activity in partnership with Connect, a charity for people living with Aphasia, to create awareness of this language disorder. Ben Kritikos creates a badland soundscape for all the shows and will also play post-show gigs while on tour with Presence Theatre.

Presence Theatre creates theatre as an art form whose primary strength lies in the power of the actor and the word and aims to help to advance the medium in every sphere: art, production, education and community. The co-producer Actors Touring Company present the best international contemporary theatre, using theatre to tell stories from different perspectives from around the world. They are currently touring The Events by David Greig which was voted Best Play 2013 by the Guardian. Actors Touring Company bring their extensive experience of UK and international touring to the co-production.

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