It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

Posted by Simon Bedford (Marketing & Touring Manager, Hoipolloi)

I'm almost there. It's my last day of work for 2008 and I've reached the last few tasks on the to-do list. Phew!

It's been an incredibly busy year and now I'm totally looking forward to my two-week holiday. I fly off to New York on Monday - bizarrely its my third trip there this year - and the first where I won't be doing any form of work whatsoever!

Anyway, rather than bore you with the details of my Christmas plans, I thought I'd take this opportunity to look back at Hoipolloi's year...

It's incredible to think of everything we've achieved this year. One full new production, two further productions touring, two productions in development, and simultaneous performances in both the UK and Colombia!

So, here in photos and videos is Hoipolloi: 2008!

The first part of the year was dedicated to creating The Doubtful Guest. The creature itself ran wild around the Barbican Estate:


Before coming alive on stage for its first performance at Watford Palace Theatre where Lyn Gardner of the Guardian proclaimed the show was a:

"piece of visual theatre that captures all the Victorian pastiche, fantastical imagination and ominous air of Gorey's original"


And as soon as the show was on its feet, it was time for Hugh, Aled (and myself) to fly off to Bogota, Colombia with Story of a Rabbit for the XI Festival Iberoamericano de Teatro:


My favourite memory of this trip was being ambushed by the South American press in the hotel lobby!

Back in the UK, Story of a Rabbit went touring around the UK. Here's Hugh being interviewed on the radio whilst in Brighton:



And not content with the simple life, Hugh dashed off in the middle of the tour for some performances of Floating in Moscow.

But he was back in time for a two-week run of the show at London's Barbican Centre:


Once that was over, it was time for me to say goodbye to one intern and welcome another!

For the past two years, August has been a crazily busy month spent in Edinburgh for the Fringe. But this year we took it easy and instead popped over to Finland for a short run at the Helsinki Festival:



The autumn saw the Bishop's and their Doubtful Guest back on the road:



The tour started with our co-producing partners at the Theatre Royal Plymouth and reached Leeds' West Yorkshire Playhouse in time for Halloween:


Finally, the year ended with Hugh and his friends at the National Theatre Studio where they've been busy preparing a potential new show called Invisible Town:



Thank you again to everyone who's seen a show, read the blog, watched a video or commented on the wall of our Facebook groups.

So, it's time for me to officially sign-off for the year. We'll be back in January and can definitely guarantee that 2009 will be even more exciting than this! Best of all, we'll be reporting all of it right here on the blog. Come join us...

A note from our friends at... Told by an Idiot

Two intensive workshops led by Told by an Idiot Co-Artistic Director, Paul Hunter

BIGGER THAN LIFE:
The role of the performer in the theatre of Told by an Idiot
Dates: Monday 12th –Wednesday 14th January 2009
Venue: Toynbee Studios, 28 Commercial Street, London E1 6AB

I THINK I’M GOING TO BURST:
Exploring the spirit of Commedia dell’Arte. This workshop will be led by both Paul Hunter and Associate ‘Idiot’ Stephen Harper
Dates: Saturday 10th –Sunday 11th January 2009
Venue: Toynbee Studios, 28 Commercial Street, London E1 6AB

The exploration of the work will use mostly performance related exercises although both workshops will also be of interest to directors and designers who are genuinely interested in collaborative theatre.

Please call the office on 020 7407 4123 or email info@toldbyanidiot.org for further information.

All gone...

Posted by Simon Bedford (Marketing & Touring Manager, Hoipolloi)

A huge thank you to everyone who's booked in to see our Invisible Town preview performances at the Barbican. We have now completely filled all available places and I'm afraid that I won't be able to release any further space.

If you haven't managed to get hold of a ticket, you'll still be able to follow what's happening with the project as we'll be providing regular updates from the rehearsal room here on the blog.

I'm also pleased to announce another Hugh Hughes project which will be coming to fruition in January!

The Wonderful World of Hugh Hughes is a brand new solo piece from Hugh. He's been working on various ideas for this over the past couple of months (in between working on Invisible Town) and the show will be premiered at The Junction, Cambridge from 29 to 31 January.

The show sees Hugh head off on a comic and compelling adventure into his fantastical world. A marvellous mixture of memories, random recollections and stories all told in his uniquely charming style.

At present, this is the ONLY opportunity to see this piece although the show might make the journey up to Edinburgh next summer.

Performances begin at 8pm and tickets cost just £5. To book yours, please visit The Junction's website by clicking here or call their Box Office on 01223 511511.

We look forward to welcoming you to the show!

Leaving the Invisible Town (for now)

Posted by David Ralfe (Marketing & Admin. Assistant, Hoipolloi)

It's Sunday evening and I've just about caught up on sleep, after spending a week cavorting round the National Theatre Studio with Hugh Hughes.

It was a real honour to watch Hugh working. I was a huge Hoipolloi fan and a devoted Hugh Hughes groupie well before I joined the company and I still have moments where I can't believe I'm on the inside, rather than in the audience.

The performers spent much of the week improvising for hours on end, which took us to some pretty strange places... The week's work threw up so many new ideas that it's hard to know where to begin sorting through them!

Here are some photos I took: in the first one Hugh is an IRA terrorist (obviously), in the second he's playing a magician who's just chopped his own hands off and the last one is Hugh sitting at the top of a hill with Wendy the aubergine (his girlfriend) showing her the town of Llangefni. Reality seems a little banal in comparison!

Extra tickets for Invisible Town

Posted by Simon Bedford (Marketing & Touring Manager, Hoipolloi)

It's Saturday night and in the Bedford household, we're glued to both Strictly Come Dancing and the X-Factor. I'm rooting for Alexandra in the X-Factor as I think she's by far the most talented performer and can't decide between Lisa and Rachel on Strictly. Mostly we're having fun counting the amount of times that Dermot says that this year's contest is "the closest yet".

Anyway, this is all totally beside the point of this blog entry. Apologies. I think I'm just trying to distract myself from the fact that I'm doing work on a Saturday night!

I'm pleased to announce that we've been able to make a further 80 places available for the preview performances of Invisible Town on 8 & 9 January. You'll be able to book these from Tuesday 16 December and a link to the booking site will appear here then.

Anyone who joined the waiting list for places over the past couple of days will shortly be receiving information on how to book.

Thanks again for all your interest in these performances. I popped into the rehearsal room a couple of times over the week and am very excited by what's being created.

Here one minute, gone the next...

Posted by Simon Bedford (Marketing & Touring Manager, Hoipolloi)

Wow, what an afternoon!

Story of a Rabbit's tagline, "Here one Minute, Gone the Next" became very pertinent today as I watched the free tickets for our scratch performances of Invisible Town at the Barbican disappear before my eyes.

After merrily disappearing to get my haircut over lunch, I returned to the office and checked to see whether anyone had decided to book in. I almost fell off my chair and couldn't believe that nearly all the spaces had gone!

A massive thank you for all your interest in the project. I know that Hugh will be delighted that so many of you would like to come along. My apologies to anyone who hasn't been able to get a place, particularly those that tried more than once to get one out of the website.

I thought that everything was running pretty smoothly but clearly the system wasn't clever enough to tell you that the tickets had all gone in the slight scramble that occured around 3pm this afternoon.

For the time being, I have a waiting list open as I hope to release a few more places nearer the time. We'll release them on a first-come, first served basis. Instructions on how to get on the list can be found by clicking the link below.

In the meantime, I'm sure that David will continue to post updates from the rehearsal room so keep coming back to hear the latest.

UPDATE!
Further places have been released for the Invisible Town performances. Capacity is still extremely limited but click on the link below to book.

Another day in Llangefni

Posted by David Ralfe (Marketing & Admin. Assistant, Hoipolloi)

Another fantastic day at the National Theatre Studio! We're doing loads of improvisations at the moment, for an hour or more at a time, moving from place to place and making up all sorts of stories and characters.

Today Hugh made an aubergine out of a glass bottle and a denim jacket. The aubergine was called Wendy and Hugh fell in love with her until his sister stole it off him. When we first met Tegin he was under the desk in the office of the lumber yard where he had a job, hiding so he wouldn't have to do any work. He was thinking about how much he loved Adam Ant and wondering why only girls could wear make-up. And at th end of the day, Hugh told us a very funny story about trying to chat up a girl who had an identical twin sister, and the sisters playing tricks on him.

Invisible Town: Exclusive Performances

Posted by Simon Bedford (Marketing & Touring Manager, Hoipolloi)


David's last couple of posts have been about what's currently happening over at the National Theatre Studio with Invisible Town. And a couple of weeks ago we hinted that you'd soon be able to get the chance to see for yourself what Hugh and his friends have been up to.

The wait is over and, to the accompaniment of a grand fanfare, I can now reveal the full details of how to catch an exclusive peak at this brand new material.

On Thursday 8 and Friday 9 January at 7pm, Hugh and his ensemble will be undertaking two free 'scratch' performances in The Pit at the Barbican Centre in London.

There are just 100 places available across both nights to see the work for FREE at this early stage and tickets can only be booked in advance by clicking on the link below.

Please note that tickets are NOT available through the Barbican's box office.

Please join us for what we hope will be an exciting part of the show's ongoing development. It's likely that this won't receive a full production until 2011 so you'll be one of the first to see what they've been up to. More information on the show can be found on various blog entries here.

Finally, thank you to the National Theatre Studio and Louise Jeffreys at the Barbican Centre for making this possible.

Linda the Laundry Lady

Posted by David Ralfe (Marketing & Admin. Assistant, Hoipolloi)

I had a great time at the National Theatre Studio today, working on Hugh Hughes' new show Invisible Town. Hugh introduced us to some new characters and I found myself having a wonderful conversation with Linda, who runs Llangefni's launderette. She was quick to notice that I had biro ink on my t-shirt and insisted that I took it off immediately so she could clean it for me. Linda's very good at spotting and identifying stains.

Can't wait to get back to the Studio tomorrow, I get more excited about the project every day I see Hugh and his wonderful collaborators working on it!

Back to the National Theatre Studio!

Posted by David Ralfe (Marketing & Admin. Assistant, Hoipolloi)

I wrote last July about our time at the National Theatre Studio, working on Hugh Hughes' new production Invisible Town. It was the first time Hugh had introduced us to the show and by the end of the week it had developed incredible momentum, branching off in all sorts of exciting directions, as Hugh and an ensemble of actors found different ways to share the stories Hugh told us about his childhood.

Next week, we'll be heading back to the Studio, to catch up with Hugh and spend five more days working on Invisible Town. Hugh's spent this week in one of the Studio's writing rooms, getting his thoughts in order before the rest of us arrive next week.

I'll be doing as much blogging as I can, and hopefully getting some video footage, so you can keep up to date with everything that's going on!

The National Theatre Studio is a wonderful space to work in and we're really grateful to have been invited to work there. This is a video taken the last time we were there, in which Hugh talks about Invisible Town and Sioned shows us the delights of the Studio's lighting facilities!

Help us with Wikipedia

Posted by David Ralfe (Marketing & Admin. Assistant, Hoipolloi)

I've just created a Hoipolloi Wikipedia page which, of course, isn't terribly good Wikipedia practice because it should really be written by YOU.

In fact, I've already attracted the wrath of one efficious wiki-lover (with too much time on their hands) who tried to delete my Story of a Rabbit entry within 10 seconds of me putting it up! We are currently arguing about it - rest assured, I will not be beaten.

But perhaps I'd get in less trouble if some people outside the company lent a hand and made their contributions to the page. That, after all, is how Wikipedia is supposed to work. So please, get cracking! If you've seen one of our shows, then write about. If you have more to say about Hugh Hughes, please speak up.

Together we'll beat the nerds!