Following the audience's lead

One of the constant challenges for arts organisations, especially those that tour work like Hoipolloi do, is building a relationship with an audience that can be sustained - even when work is not out 'on the road'. Talking about 'the audience' all too often means thinking about the people who experience your work as a homogenous unit, when they are anything but.

Hoipolloi has been fortunate that Hugh Hughes, who we've been working with since 2005, so readily embraces social media. This enables some degree of a continued conversation, but we also know that twitter and facebook are not everybody's cup of tea. We've also been open to exploring opportunities beyond the stage, and the recent success of Floating on Radio 4, that that earned Hugh a BBC Audio Drama Award for Best Scripted Comedy Drama, also brought us a huge audience.

We were really excited about opening up Hugh's childhood home online, because we knew this offer was a unique way to experience the magic of Hugh Hughes when and where the audience please. We know, however, that not all Hugh's fans want to experience work in this way, and even those that do have radically different approaches to the site. Some people start on the home page and work methodically through the stories as though they are actually walking through the house; some people jump straight into a story through a link they found on twitter or facebook; some people wander around the online space looking at the floorplans and Hugh's notes without listening to stories at all; some people put stories on 'in the background' whilst they do other things. With the glorious variety of Hoipolloi's audience in mind, we've continued to work with the material that we've made available online at www.invisibletownstories.co.uk in an attempt to make the experience of visiting as unique as each visitor. We've started to offer particular collections of stories, curated by people. My own collection is simply my favourites at a particular point in time that capture something of the whimsy and perspective that I think makes Hugh so compelling. Each collection has a description that will tickle particular fancies - want a flavour of the site without having to make decisions about which story to choose? We've got a single track, curated by Hugh. Or maybe you're fascinated by Hugh's love of pigeons?

Most exciting of all, perhaps, is that we listened to feedback, and have created Hugh Hughes FM. We're delighted to announce this development, which will suit both those who want to listen whilst doing other things, and those who are open to serendipity and want to be surprised. Find it at http://invisibletownstories.co.uk/radio

Floating wins an award

 

I'm very proud to announce that Hugh Hughes won Best Scripted Comedy Drama at the BBC Audio Drama Awards last night. It's a real honour, particularly as Floating was both Hugh's first live show and his first work to be broadcast on the radio.

Andrew Davies, who wrote the TV adaptation of Pride and Prejudice, was one of the judges in Hugh's category and this is what he had to say about Floating:

"Floating was totally original. Generally I hate fantasy, but this was very different, somehow sweetly earnest as well as daft, with sadness at the heart of it. I loved it that it had a cast of two, and I’d never heard of either of them. It used the radio medium with enormous (concealed) sophistication and reminded one of the almost limitless power of radio to create a world."


The award itself was presented by actor Richard Wilson and, as you can see from the photo, Hugh also met David Tennant who was master of ceremonies.

It being radio awards, someone sneakily managed to record some audio of Hugh on stage...



 Simon Bedford (Executive Producer, Hoipolloi)

Welcome to 2012

A belated Happy New Year from myself, Hugh Hughes and the rest of the Hoipolloi team. We're all really looking forward to the year ahead. It's certainly going to be busy and I hope you'll be able to join us along the way.

Hugh has already started the year with some very good news. His afternoon play version of Floating, created with BBC Radio 4 has been nominated for "Best Scripted Comedy Drama" at the first ever BBC Audio Drama Awards. The ceremony, to be hosted by David Tennant, takes place on 29 January and we'll let you know how he gets on.

A huge thank you to everyone who joined us during the autumn. I certainly had lots of fun driving Hugh to a couple of places for performances of 360 and the year ended in style with the run of Story of a Rabbit at Sydney Opera House.

At present, we're in the thick of development for Hugh's brand new project, Stories from an Invisible Town. Here's a quick intro from Hugh...

Stories from an Invisible Town - An Introduction (by Hugh Hughes by hughhughes

It'll be both an online space and a live work, which will tour the UK in the autumn. We'll be announcing more information as the year progresses but if you're in Cambridge, you can get some sneak previews by joining Hugh for some further work-in-progress performances at The Junction. These take place on 8 March, 20 April and 25 May. More details here.

We look forward to sharing our work with you in the not too distant future and hope you'll be able to join us at some point this year.

Simon Bedford
Executive Producer, Hoipolloi

ps. if you live in or near Cambridge, we think these might be of interest...

NIE: Clown on stage - a master class at The Junction
This Master Class led by NIE’s Artistic Director, Alex Byrne will explore the physical preparation of the body for performance through work on pure and expressive movement and the playfulness of the actors in performance through games and group work. Alex will explore work in red noses as a way to access emotions, material and playfulness.

Saturday 4 February from 11am – 6pm
Suitable for ages 18+
Price: £35 (£25 conc)

To book: please visit www.junction.co.uk/artist/4058

HOTBED 2012: CAMBRIDGE’S NEW WRITING FESTIVAL

26 - 29 January at The Junction

12 new commissions, live literature, film showings, masterclasses, workshops, a One-Page-Play Competition and free foyer events.

Writers at Hotbed: Janice Okoh (Bruntwood Award Winner 2011); Ed Harris (Writers’ Guild Award Winner 2011); Chris O’Connell (Multiple Fringe First Award Winner), plus many more of the UK’s leading and up-and-coming writers.

Guest Production: Hotbed will host world-class production of SILENT by Ireland’s leading new writing company, Fishamble.  The show was the hit of the 2011 Edinburgh Fringe Festival and won a plethora of awards, including the prestigious Fringe First Award.

Box office: 01223 511511 or book online: www.junction.co.uk

Floating on BBC Radio 4

Hoipolloi are excited to announce that Floating has been adapted into a radio play, to be broadcast on BBC Radio 4 on Friday 9 September at 2.15pm.

Floating (and Hugh Hughes) have been on an incredible journey since the very first performance of the show at the Old Museum Arts Centre in Belfast on 12 September 2005.

I remember that day very vividly - it was part of the first tour I ever booked for the company. It was a pleasure to witness how the audience were delightfully confused and excited by the story unfolding in front of them. And that first show last well over 2 hours!

Having started at Hoipolloi at the beginning of 2005, it’s been a real pleasure to share in the successful journey of this show. From its simple beginnings in Belfast, to a rewarding run at the Edinburgh Fringe in 2006 (winning a Total Theatre Award) and performances at London’s Barbican Centre, Sydney Opera House and most recently a trip to Canada (visiting Vancouver, Victoria and Toronto).

We really hope you’ll be able to tune in and listen to this new version of the show. And please share the news with your friends and family too.

You’ll also notice some brand new dates in the performance calendar. These include a brief visit to London’s Roundhouse with Floating and 360. These performances are taking place in the Roundhouse’s studio, which has a very limited capacity so if you want to come, I’d advise booking early.

Posted by Simon Bedford (Executive Producer, Hoipolloi)
With thanks to machoismtango for the image

John Hegley's Hoipolloi Limerick!

Our Artistic Director Shon Dale-Jones just made a small but perfectly formed contribution to John Hegley's Radio 4 documentary There Was a Young Man From Limerick.

It's a lovely little show, featuring a latin limerick allegedly written by Thomas Aquinas, Wendy Cope's limerick version of TS Eliot's The Wastelands, "serious" limericks and lots of discussion of Edward Lear, the much-loved nonsense poet who popularised the limerick and whose work inspired Hoipolloi's show My Uncle Arly.

You can click here to launch BBC iPlayer and listen to the show anytime for the next seven days.

John Hegley introduced Shon in a typically quirky fashion, with this "limerick":

....Shon Dale-Jones
Who write and directs and who hones
Works for the stage
Which inform and engage
And his company Hoipolloi have used some of Edward lear's limericks in the creation of a biographical drama.

We'd like to thank John Hegley and BBC Radio 4 for inviting Shon onto the show.

I hope you get chance to listen on iPlayer this week if you didn't catch it first time round!

There Was a Young Man From Limerick

Tomorrow, Hoipolloi's Artistic Director, Shon Dale-Jones, will be featured on a Radio 4 documentary about limericks. The show has been put together by John Hegley, the renowned performance poet, who has ammassed a legion of fans over the years (inluding Shon!) with his uniquely comic and quirky performances.

John Hegley is famous for his humourous rhymes and feelgood performances. Recurring motifs of his writing include dogs, his hometown Luton and glasses. In one recent show, he invited everyone in the audience who was wearing glasses to join him on stage for a "glasses dance", and he regularly rants against the "deserters" who opt for contact lenses!

Shon has admired John's work for years and was delighted to be invited onto the show. The two of them met up recently to record some musings on their mutual love of limericks.

The limerick, of course, was popularised in the 1860s by Edward Lear, whose nonsense verse inspired Hoipolloi's show My Uncle Arly. Arly is about to go back out on tour - click here for my recent Blog post with all the tour details.

There Was a Young Man From Limerick will be broadcast on BBC Radio 4 at 11.30am on Tuesday 24 February. You'll be able to listen again on iPlayer for a week after the show is broadcast.