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The North Wall
Amy Walters, Theatre Manager
Home-grown Productions
This year, alongside the public receiving
programme, The North Wall produced two
plays, each a product of our residential
outreach work.
Fast Track
(October 2014) was originally
written in 2012, and was developed by
young writer Catriona Kerridge and The
North Wall’s artistic director Lucy Maycock.
The production grew out of the brief to
explore the impact of the recession on
today’s younger generation, and the project
received our first ever Arts Council funding,
and premiered here to near sell-out houses.
Song of Riots
(April 2015) was a co-
production with Swedish company, Awake
Projects, and was written and directed by
Lucy Maycock. Following its premiere in
Oxford, the play toured Europe in the
spring. In October 2015, it went on to
Battersea Arts Centre in London, where it
received critical acclaim in the national
press, and the Stockholm Fringe Festival,
where it won the Audience Choice award.
The casts of both plays featured young
actors drawn from previous residential
projects, and were designed by Alex Berry,
an alumna of the 2011 Summer Residency
who has gone on to train and work
professionally as a theatre designer.
Arts Laboratory at The North Wall
The North Wall’s outreach residencies for
young artists, masterclasses, and
collaborations with professional theatre
companies now exist under one umbrella,
Arts Laboratory (ArtsLab). These activities
take place outside of St Edward’s term time,
to take advantage of an otherwise empty
space. ArtsLab projects help us to achieve
our core mission: to remove barriers that
prevent talented young artists from
achieving meaningful careers in the arts.
In Easter 2015, we ran
TheatreCraft
, our
first ever residency focusing on emerging
writers and directors. We had a huge
response to the callout, reading submissions
from over 100 writers and 30 directors.
After a lengthy assessment process, we
selected six writers and three directors, who
came together to work for two weeks with
two professional directors and two
professional writers.
July and August 2015 saw a number of
projects unfold at The North Wall.
Internationally-renowned company Theatre
Ad Infinitum worked on a new piece of
political theatre,
Bucket List
, looking at the
conflicts of life in a Mexican border town, as
well as leading a residency with young actors
to develop an adaptation of the Norwegian
epic novel,
Kristin Lavransdatter
. Awake
Projects’ Christopher Sivertsen was also
back in residence, working with playwright
Tom Wainwright and a small group of
actor-musicians on a new play.
Future Plans
In Spring 2016, to coincide with our 10th
Anniversary Year, The North Wall plans
to launch
StageWrite
, a new year-round
programme for talented young writers.
This will also coincide with the creation
of a Writer-in-Residence post.
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