Theatre Festival: Contacting the World
Article published: Saturday, July 24th 2010
Manchester’s Contact Theatre is hosting Contacting the World, an international festival of theatrical arts, until 26 July. Virginia Fernandez spoke to the theatre’s Artistic Director, Baba Israel, about the project.
Contacting the World was born in a coffee shop in New Delhi. Founder Noel Greig dreamt of a global theatre project, able to bring young people around the world together to share ideas and produce new work. In 2002, his dream became reality.
This year, the biennial festival runs 19-26 July and is already demonstrating powerful creativity, with thirteen international companies offering innovative ideas. Performances, workshops, forums and debates are transforming Manchester into an exiting, international theatre meeting point.
Virginia Fernandez: Do you ‘Contacting the World’ to be about more than a theatre festival?
Babba Isreal: It’s much more. It’s about culture exchange and creating a kind of global dialogue through young people in a very significant way. It is also about building relationships. From January, different theatre companies around the world have been twinned together. For example, this year Manchester company 10p Mix Up was paired with another company from Mumbai, India, called Working title 2.0. Companies have an interaction over many months, online. They share diaries, blogging, videos, photos… things about their lives and their performances.
VF: What can we expect at the festival?
BI: It’s a real mix. The main goal is creating original pieces. For instance, the company from Manchester has created a play called The Lost Lizard, which is a kind of fairy tale. It’s extraordinary as issues they discovered learning about India [have become] questions and ideas about society explored through fairy tale. Then we have the company Cuciotak, from Indonesia, bringing traditional aspects to their work. They are very involved with the traditional Japanese and Indonesian theatre, based in masks and music. Then there’s a group coming from USA, First wave hip hop ensemble, who are combining hip-hop and spoken words with theatre. It’s a real diversity. It’s a kind of traditional and contemporary theatre; we have some many different interpretations about theatre.
VF: Do you think that theatre is able to speak a universal language?
BI: Definitely. Theatre is a reflection of human experiences. We find the things that make us human: emotions, stories, conflicts, love, struggles, imagination, explorations; everything from the real and the surreal. Theatre gives us a place where we can interpret our experiences as people. It’s one of the ways that communities come together and understand each other. Theatre has been used to set or change social values. It’s very universal because you have a lot of share languages in music, movement…
VF: Can Manchester transform into a ‘theatre city’?
BI: I think there’s always been a strong tradition of theatre in Manchester, with great diversity. From the Royal Exchange to the Green Room, to Contact, to the Library Theatre, to the Festival 24:7… people are starting to learn about these and other festivals, which have been happening for a long time. The main thing is how to improve awareness in Manchester. The real challenge is how to spread to the world about the energy delivered in the festival’s project.
VF: From the work already performed, it seems that exploring the work shown at Contacting the World is a good place to start.
For more information, visit: http://www.contactingtheworld.org/
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