Ultrapure sounds like a high-tech happening. Using performance, video and music, it is a kind of theatrical installation that questions US popular culture and our fascination with it.
This is not a sit-down piece of theatre and audiences are expected to be as moveable a feast as Ultrapure itself. Not, I suspect, for shrinking violets.
Presented as part of the Royal CourtBarclays New Stages Festival, it is a collaboration between the Royal Court Young People’s Theatre, Youth Cable TV, North Kensington Video and Drama Project and Blast Theory. It happens, in every sense of the word, on July 1 to 3 at the Theatre Upstairs, Royal Court Theatre, Sloane Square. Details: 0171 730 1745.
Tonight, students on the University of Reading’s Theatre of the Deaf course perform Wall of Glass, which has been specially written for an international conference on theatre and disability in Poland. Deaf and hearing students are trained in theatre and drama to work with deaf children and adults.
Next term, it changes from a two-year Diploma in Higher Education to a three-year BA (Hons) degree in theatre arts, education and deaf culture. Wall of Glass is at Bulmershe Court, University of Reading tonight at 7.30pm. Details: 01734 318837.
Congratulations to Skipton Girls’ High School, which recently opened its new drama and dance studio in the presence of Dame Judi Dench, after whom the studio is named.
Drama-loving students might like to go on an acting course at the West Yorkshire Playhouse from July 29 to August 3. Students aged 16 and above will work with director Michael Birch on Romeo and Juliet. Only 200 places are available. For further details, ring Liz Margree on 0113 244 2141.
It’s not Christmas nor even the summer holidays, but the Salisbury Playhouse is putting on a family show in its mainhouse. The Adventures of Pinocchio, adapted by Peter Biddle and Theatro Kismet, is aimed at four to 11-year-olds and runs until July 6.
Thanks to a grant from the Hamlyn Foundation, the theatre is running a pilot transport scheme to help schools bring children to see the play.
Research showed the cost of transport was a major obstacle to schools booking theatre visits. The scheme pays half of the travel costs for county assisted schools. The theatre hopes to make the scheme permanent. To make bookings for Pinocchio, ring 01722 320333.
