McFilter

Theatregoing

I'm much enjoying the recently-launched Liverpool Long-reads blog. The latest article digs into the state of the city's theatres, which made me ponder why I don't go to the theatre more often.

Living in the Georgian Quarter, I walk past most of them pretty often, but I think the last time I ventured inside was in early 2017.

I think the main problem is that I don't know what's on. I seem to manage to generally hear a bit about all of the exhibitions in the various galleries around the city, but I'm not hooked into the theatre scene in the same way. I'm also not as sure of what I might like, or what I should avoid, than I am with art. I suppose it's harder to bail on some theatre production that's not of interest than it is to just cut a gallery visit short.

All that said, the last time I went to the theatre was to one of the Everyman's Scratch Studio mornings. That was a thoroughly enjoyable sampling-menu sort of event, where we got to watch a single scene of a range of different in-development pieces.

I'd never have signed up for a play which (if memory serves) showed a dystopian future where the population was a cult trapped on an island by its religious beliefs, all played out (including the waves of the sea) by interpretive dance, but it was really engaging. I'm not sure I'd sign up for an entire play of that just yet, but it opened my mind to experiencing more of it.

There were some other pieces that I would have happily gone to see in full, but I didn't. Partly because I don't know if they made it to production. There's maybe a loop there for the team at the Everyman to look at closing.

All that said, that article prompted this blog post which prompted me to dig out a link to the Scratch Studio programme which made me realise that it's still running. So I'm going to go along again. Anyone fancy joining me?