All across the world

In just over 24 hours time, a momentous occasion in the history of Hoipolloi will occur. When I discovered this, just yesterday, I shrieked with excitement at the good fortune that's being delivered to us by time zone variations!

Our first performance of Floating here at the Ten Days on the Island festival in Launceston, Tasmania kicks off at 2pm on Saturday. This also happens to be 8pm on Friday in Los Angeles when My Uncle Arly will be 30mins into its first public performance at UCLA's Freud Playhouse.

And thus, for the very first time, two Hoipolloi shows will be playing at exactly the same time in two differerent corners of the world, neither of which are our home territory!

It's not actually the first time we've had two shows performed on different continents on the same day; if you cast your mind back to about this time last year, Hugh and Aled were over in Bogota, Colombia performing Story of a Rabbit whilst The Doubtful Guest was running at Watford Palace. However, none of these performances occured at exactly the same moment in time.

If you're in the UK and would like to celebrate the moment, I'm afraid you'll have to stay up until 3am on Saturday morning, but if you happen to be in Los Angeles or Launceston, please join us for one of these historic shows!

Life on the ocean waves

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

As you might have guessed, this post has a nautical theme.

It's all in honour of a little ship called YM Utmost which at present is speeding from Felixstowe to Antwerp on its way to Singapore and Sydney.

Actually to be honest, it's actually quite a big ship; a bit of digging on the internet tells me that its 336m long (0r 194.4 smoots) and can carry approx 8,189 standard-sized containers. I've found some photos but to keep on the right side of the copyright laws, I'll ask you to click on this link if you'd like to take a look.

If you're wondering, the photo above is the Utmost's sister ship YM Success, thank you to Uzvards for sharing.

So why is this of interest, I hear you cry. Don't worry, I've not become a ship spotter (is that the correct terminology?) - it's just that it is the current and temporary home of the sets/costumes/props for Floating and Story of a Rabbit.

Our foreign tours have become a step closer with this first stage in our journey across the world. Sadly I can't get the tracker to work on the shipping site above so I don't think I'll be able to give you regular updates.

But needless to say, we'll be letting you know when it's arrived safely along with the human cargo that will be flying out in mid-February!

And whilst we're talking about our international touring, a warm welcome to the many Australian visitors who've arrived at our sites over the last 24 hours. We look forward to seeing you in Sydney, Melbourne or Tasmania!

Ten Days on the Island... hopefully not Floating away!

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

As David's already mentioned, next year Hoipolloi and Hugh Hughes will be spreading their wings and going global! We've discussed before on this blog (in some detail, as we are stupidly excited about it!) our trip out to Sydney Opera House but that's not the only place we'll be visiting in Australia.

On Tuesday, the Ten Days on the Island festival had its official launch and so we're finally able to reveal to you some further performance dates. It's an honour to be part of this exciting event and Hugh is really hoping to make some fantastic new connections with another set of island dwellers - this time on the other side of the world in Tasmania.

So, here's the exact information on where we'll be:



Earl Arts Centre in Launceston, Tasmania
28 March 2009 at 2pm and 6pm
29 March 2009 at 6pm

Playhouse Theatre in Hobart, Tasmania
2 to 4 April 2009 at 8pm
5 April at 6pm

Tickets for both venues can be booked online here

That leaves just one more set of Australian dates to announce, over in Melbourne! Hopefully we'll be able to do this very soon, keep checking back here for the latest.

And thanks to Foraggio Fotographics for the image!