Theatre in the Time of Corona

Dear theatre friend,

We’re isolated, but not alone– many are putting plays online to help fill the huge hole left by theatres closing. Here’s an article from The Guardian listing the “best” plays and dance to stream. And the first is “Key Change” by Catrina McHugh, which won my Award in 2015. I watched it again after countless times and its powerhasn’t diminished from my first viewing at the Fringe.

I’m not yet giving up hope that Edinburgh’s Festival Fringe may still go on this August. Here’s the latest article about plans being made by the wonderful, stoic Scot organizers. I know of several companies, however, who’ve had to postpone and are planning for their productions to go on in 2021 instead.

I hadn’t realized how many of my readers love poetry. Here’s one from a friend, MacArthur Grant winning dance/theatre maker, Martha Clarke—

“The Peace of Wild Things” by Wendell Barry
When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

And another, dare I say, “uplifting” poem, “Welcome Morning” by Anne Sexton– beautifully performed on YouTubeby another friend, actor Caroline Kinsolving.

If you haven’t yet discovered the pleasure of radio plays, do try “Subterranean Homesick Blues” by A.L. Kennedy, starring the ever fabulous Bill Nighy, onBBC 15 Minute Drama.

I’ll think of other tales from my lifelong love affair with theatre and the arts if I don’t get more from you– please, please write a vignette — helping us keep our connection alive for however long it takes.

And, once again, thank you for reading.