Everyword Festival

For anyone aspiring to be a writer, wanting to see a new play in development or wanting to work with the UK’s leading practitioners, Everyword 2011 new writing festival is a two-week whirlwind of events, readings, discussions, debates and workshops.

This year the festival moves to the Playhouse taking full advantage of the different spaces around the building, including the exciting reopening of the Playhouse Studio, from Monday 7 to Saturday 19 November 2011.

Internationally acclaimed new writing company nabokov return to the Everyword festival with a work in progress presentation of Liverpool playwright Michael McLean’s new play Grotesque Chaos. Paul McGann takes on this one man show which will be an unflinching look at one of Liverpool’s most controversial sons: Derek Hatton. Expect an exhilarating clash of live action and animation in the Playhouse Studio on 17 and 18 November.

This year’s festival will coincide with the 100th birthday of the Playhouse on 11 November. With this in mind, critically acclaimed High Hearted Theatre have been commissioned to create a piece to be performed on the day to celebrate the centenary of the Playhouse Repertory Company. Set in different spaces around the building, this performance will be unique to the Playhouse and its wonderful history. The piece will feature new work by Liverpool Playwrights Chloe Moss (The Way Home), Helen Blakeman (The Morris) and Jeff Young (Rag and Bone – Everyman Unbound).

Everyword will also feature First Words, a creative project with tutti frutti productions, Dukes Theatre Lancaster and Sheffield Theatres, which nurtures and develops writers to create theatre for children aged 3-7 years. Six writers, including Liverpool’s Laurence Wilson (Blackberry Trout Face) and Esther Wilson (Ten Tiny Toes), will take over the building for one special day and invite children to come along and open their imaginations for the creation of new theatre especially for them.

The Everyman and Playhouse’s current writers on attachment will all present their current projects during the festival. There will be rehearsed readings of Keith Saha’s Cornershop Homesick Blues, The Deafening Silence by Ella Carmen Greenhill and Scarlett and the Silent Disco by Colette Kane. Former Everyman Young Writer Kellie Smith will also present a rehearsed reading of her latest play The Moment You Stop.

Throughout the two-week festival there will be many workshops during the day that are sure to inform and inspire aspiring writers. Leading voices from the industry will lead these events including Punchdrunk, BBC Writersroom, Soho Theatre & Writers’ Centre and writers such as Kaite O’Reilly and Mike Bartlett.

Everyword has seen the first readings of many new plays that have progressed to full-scale productions, which, in the past year alone, include Tiny Volcanoes, Dead Heavy Fantastic, Endz and this season’s The Swallowing Dark.

BOOKING INFORMATION

Box Office: 0151 709 4776
Liverpool Playhouse, Williamson Square, Liverpool, L1 1EL
www.everymanplayhouse.com
Ticket Prices - All £5. Except for BBC Writersroom workshop (free) and High Hearted Theatre special centenary event Cheer Up, This is Only the Beginning (£10).

SCHEDULE OF EVENTS

MONDAY 7 NOVEMBER

Workshop: Stories From Your Life
Leader: Sonia Hughes. 1pm – 4pm, Playhouse Studio

Reading of Work In Progress: Cornershop Homesick Blues by Keith Saha
7.45pm, Playhouse Studio

TUESDAY 8 NOVEMBER

Workshop: Treatments – And You Thought Writing The Script Was Hard
Leader: LA Productions. 1pm – 3pm, Playhouse Studio

Workshop: Exploring Theatrical Form
Leader: Mike Bartlett. 1pm – 4pm, Playhouse Stalls Bar

WEDNESDAY 9 NOVEMBER

Workshop: Responding to Site
Leader: Peter Higgin/Punchdrunk. 1pm – 4pm, Playhouse Studio

Reading / Showing of Work In Progress: Scarlett and the Silent Disco by Colette Kane
7.45pm, Playhouse Studio

THURSDAY 10 NOVEMBER

Workshop: Creating Environment in your Writing
Leader: Kaite O’Reilly. 12pm – 3pm (please note earlier start time), Playhouse Studio

Reading: The Roses Die and Bloom by Joe Ward Munrow
7.45pm, Playhouse Studio

FRIDAY 11 NOVEMBER

Playhouse Centenary Event: Cheer Up, This is only the beginning
2pm & 5pm, Around the Playhouse

SATURDAY 12 NOVEMBER

Playhouse Centenary Event: Cheer Up, This is only the beginning
12pm & 5pm, Around the Playhouse

Reading: Fighting Ghosts by Claire Barry
7.45pm, Playhouse Studio

Performance: Chapel Street by Luke Barnes
Directed by Cheryl Gallacher
9.30pm, Playhouse Studio

MONDAY 14 NOVEMBER

Reading: The Deafening Silence by Ella Carmen Greenhill
7.45pm, Playhouse Studio

TUESDAY 15 NOVEMBER

Work In Progress & Panel Discussion: First Words
7.45pm, Playhouse Studio

WEDNESDAY 16 NOVEMBER

Workshop: The Role of the Writer in Devising
Leader: Chris Thorpe
1pm – 4pm, Playhouse Studio

Work In Progress Presentation: There Has (Possibly) Been An Incident By Chris Thorpe
5pm, Playhouse

Studio Reading: Desolate Heaven by Ailis Ni Riain
7.45pm, Playhouse Studio

THURSDAY 17 NOVEMBER

Installation: You Can Take It With You
Presented by All Across The Telegraphs

Work In Progress Presentation: Grotesque Chaos by Michael McLean
Presented by Liverpool Everyman and Playhouse and nabokov
7.45pmPlayhouse Studio

FRIDAY 18 NOVEMBER

Workshop: Writing Radio Drama
Leader: BBC writersroom
1pm – 4pm, Playhouse Studio FREE

Work In Progress Presentation: Grotesque Chaos by Michael McLean
Presented by Liverpool Everyman and Playhouse and nabokov
7.45pm, Playhouse Studio

SATURDAY 19 NOVEMBER

Workshop: Being Brave, Bold and Beautiful in conjunction with Soho Theatre & Writers’ Centre
Leader: Sarah Dickenson. 1pm – 4pm, Playhouse Studio

Work In Progress Presentation: The Moment You Stop by Kellie Smith
7.45pm, Playhouse Studio