news

Representing England

Trojan Women in Canada July and August 2008

Fresh from its premiere in Manchester and performance at the Buxton Fringe festival, Eyewitness will be bringing their adaptation of TROJAN WOMEN to Canada. Click on Winnipeg, Saskatoon or Edmonton for details and times.

Click here for Trojan Women programme notes

Canadian International Theatre Festival Edmonton 2008

Eyewitness Theatre Company will be representing England at the Canadian International Theatre Festival in Edmonton. We’ve won this before with 'Our Daily Bread' in 1995 and with 'Family Affairs' in 1998. Considering that both of these plays were about English child protection incidents (and procedures) the interest from Canadian audiences was phenomenal. (Our Daily Bread won the US Festival later that year).
This time around we are performing an adaptation by Peter Mc Garry of 'Trojan Women' by Euripides. We will also be performing at the Winnepeg festival in Canada.

Eyewitness at 24:7: Reviews

Click for reviews at: Manchester Evening News, British Theatre Guide, BBC

Eyewitness performed Peter McGarry's 'Medea at the Manchester 24:7 Festival from 23rd to 29th June 2007.

Carly Tarett features as Medea at the Manchester 24:7 Festival with Peter McGarry's adaptation of 'Medea' from 23rd to 29th June 2007. This is an opportunity to see Carly, a regular feature of our safeguarding children modules, perform in a ‘mainstream’ play. Her performance (we promise!) will be spellbinding. The company seldom ventures into the field of mainstream performance but has toured globally (Australasia, North America, South Africa, Austria, Germany, Ireland and Vietnam) with full length plays devised from its modules - often to great acclaim. For example, OUR DAILY BREAD, a play about child abuse(set in Manchester) has won six international awards. HOME TO ROOST a piece about child bereavement won the US International Theatre Festival in Orlando in 1999.
While a Greek tragedy Medea is, in essence, the mother of all child abuse plays, and Eyewitness is not unfamiliar with the motive and censure behind the murder of children. Eyewitness will consolidate Medea into its ‘Serious Case Reviews’ module later in the year.

see www.247theatrefestival.co.uk for more details and watch out for our newsletter

Euripides Adapted

Eyewitness Theatre Company’s production of Medea frames Euripides’ original text acutely within the post-modernist structure of motivation and outcome.

Rather than telling the story in linear mode with the murder of Medea’s children at the closing stages of the plot, Peter McGarry’s 21st century interpretation adds substantial weight to this main premise by repeating it over and over. Through this, the audience is invited to comprehend the rationale and incentive for Medea’s action.
How can a mother, in whatever era, bring herself to slay her own children? What dark forces compel her to commit this most dreadful of crimes? Is she so evil? Or mad? Or both?

The Chorus (of 105 Corinthian women) is played by just one actor, Laura Danielle Sharpe, but retains its original role in the play. Her cynical goading and critique of Medea’s motives echoes Euripides’ original blend of innovative satire and social commentary.

Euripides did not punish Medea for her iniquities but allowed her to escape in a golden chariot. Our Medea is not so fortunate. Her penalty for murdering her children? To enact the part of Medea – over and over, in different times and arenas. With her chorus of one for companionship she wanders through time not knowing whether or not she is Medea or why she has to play her role.