Au revoir

It seems that all good things really must come to an end, alas, and so it is time for me to bid farewell and move onwards to pastures new. It seems like just moments ago that I was sitting in the bar at the Traverse theatre in Edinburgh writing my very first blog post, and even though it was longer ago, it feels that it is mere seconds (time is funny like that) since I came to the Hoipolloi office for the very first time for my interview with Simon, Louise and David. I was extremely flustered as I'd managed to trip over on the zebra crossing on Mill Road, making a complete fool of myself and causing a number of passers by to glance over and give me a patronising 'oh dear, you silly girl' look.

Having had the traditional 'oh cripes, I'm graduating and will no longer be protected from the world by the warm and familiar embrace of education' I realised that I needed to find something to do with my life. Of course I'd given up hope of finding a 'real job' ages ago and set my little heart on a life in the theatre. Luckily Hoipolloi took me on board, otherwise who knows where I would have ended up. Probably outside the backstage door of a theatre somewhere begging for a job. Or rocking gently in a 'home' muttering 'please can I direct plays'.

This year has been super, or as Hugh would put it, 'brilliant!' (insert welsh accent, thankfully you can't hear my appalling attempt). I won't list all of the best bits, - if I do I'll start to get ridiculously nostalgic and start to cry and though I don't know much about computers (although thanks to Simon I am definitely less technologically backwards than I was when I arrived) I'm guessing floods of tears never did them any good - but there have been hundreds. In fact I don't think I'll ever be able to drink a cup of fruit or green tea again without wistfully thinking back to the halcyon days spent in Dale's Brewery. Not only have I had a lot of fun, but I've also learnt many essential life skills which should equip me for the big bad world. These include how to write a blog, printing on headed paper, what a 'hashcode' is and navigating my way around Google Analytics. With all of this knowledge I think I'm going to be just fine masquerading as a real adult. After a recent conversation with Hugh I'm also keen to find out whether painting your legs yellow would make you run faster. If you see me running around with fluorescent legs one day, you'll know why.

To prevent this cascading into a total wallow of sentimentality I'm going to start rounding things up by saying a big thank you to everyone at Hoipolloi for a wonderful year. Thank you also to anyone who has read the blog. I hope you've enjoyed reading it as much as I've enjoyed writing it, and good luck to the new interns! I'm leaving Cambridge to train to be a director in the big bright city of London, so as I won't be terribly far away, nor leaving the theatrical world, I'm hoping that this is not 'goodbye', but merely 'au revoir'.

Thanks to Peter Kaminski for the photo

The end of the Rabbit run...

Posted by Sara Green (Marketing and Admin Assistant, Hoipolloi)

After a crazy couple of months, the first tour of Hugh Hughes’ second hit Story of a Rabbit has come to an end. But what an ending it was! With a two week run at the Barbican’s Pit Theatre as part of bite08 the show went out with a bang, impressing audiences and critics alike and generating a fantastic response each night.

As well as being excited about performing in such a prestigious venue, Hugh and Aled were pleased to see so many old faces return to see the show as well as welcoming the new connections they made in London. It was definitely the perfect way to end a hugely successful tour and the ridiculously busy season we have had at Hoipolloi.

The show has really grown over the past few months, becoming increasingly funny and, believe it or not, more moving every time I see it. I think this was confirmed by the raucous laughter followed by thoughtful silences that I witnessed in the theatre last week and the queues of tearful women in the toilets afterwards, including me, hastily reapplying mascara proves my point.

One of our favourite responses to the show was posted at the Hugh Hughes Appreciation Society on Facebook

“Possibly the only show I have ever been to where my friend came out with tears of laughter and I came out with tears of sadness. Truly remarkable.”

But if now you are getting upset at the prospect of not seeing a Hoipolloi show again, fear not.

We are currently finalising the autumn tour of The Doubtful Guest, not to mention a host of international dates for Hugh Hughes that will be announced in the next few weeks. So put those hankies away and save them for Story of a Rabbit’s return, you’ll need ’em!

And for those who want an extra dose of Hugh, here's one of his videos to enjoy! To find more, why not visit our YouTube channel.

Two days of madness...

Posted by Sara Green, (Marketing and Admin Assistant, Hoipolloi.)
With the focus being very much on The Doubtful Guest at the moment, it is sometimes easy to forget that the Story of a Rabbit spring tour is also almost upon us. The last couple of days were a real reminder of this. Being the only time that was relatively free in the Hoipolloi schedule, we headed over to the Junction in Cambridge for two days of Rabbit rehearsals, the first since Edinburgh and the last until Bogota.

As soon as I arrived at the rehearsal room on Monday morning, there were jobs to be done. Unloading all of the set took a long time then we had to set it up, including all of the thoroughly complicated wires and technical equipment, as well as organising cups of tea for all involved. Before we knew it lunch was upon us and we had only just erected the set.

This was a fascinating process in itself. Never having actually been backstage on this show or investigated the set I found it really interesting unpacking all of the intricate little details that make it up. It made me remember items such as the rubber gloves, the action man and even the potato, which I had completely forgotten existed! It was really different to the experience I had at the Doubtful Guest rehearsals. There the props and set were really random, thrown together for experimental purposes and then used to try out new ideas. But for Story of a Rabbit every tiny object was accounted for, down to the box of tea bags and the newspaper and train tickets that are one hundred percent genuine. Everything has its own place and the whole show is really organised. Perhaps this is down to Hugh’s meticulous planning or Aled’s careful preparation, or maybe it is because in Edinburgh you have to be organised, especially when you have a quick turn around!

After indulging Hugh in an absurd conversation about aliens which left me intrigued and, if I’m honest, a little confused, we set about preparing for a run of the show. This involved me and Ricahrd (Couldrey, the production manager) desperately putting cables into sockets and switching things on and off, me trying really hard to open up the flipchart which was being extremely stubborn and one last check to make sure everything was in place. Meanwhile Hugh was sat in the corner, peering at the video recording of himself, trying to remember exactly what he says and at what point.

I left Hugh and Aled to run the show and returned the following morning to weigh and measure the entire set and all the props and record it all onto a spreadsheet. My technical skills have never been admired and so this job took longer than expected, and several times Richard had to explain that pressing “paste” is not the same as inserting cells, the main difference being you don’t delete half of what you spent all morning doing.

However, after many cups of tea and several panics we finished and even managed to pack everything back into the van before five o’clock. I never really appreciated just how much work goes into taking a show to an international venue, and that also not all of what you would call “rehearsal” is actually running the show. Most of these two days were spent familiarising ourselves with this production and doing tasks that needed to be done. It was a great experience and even though now it is back to The Doubtful Guest, it is good to think that we also have another, equally exciting tour ahead of us…