CityLife

Theatre festival Re:Play 2010 gives you another chance

ONE of the issues around some of the very best new theatre shows, many of them in non-traditional or fringe venues, is that, for perfectly understandable reasons such as the relative shortness of the runs, people sometimes simply don’t get the chance to see them.

Then they get acclaimed by critics or, as often happens, nominated for a Manchester Evening News Theatre Award and their potential audience is left thinking, “Why on Earth did I shell out for a Les Mis ticket when, for considerably less, I could have seen this fantastic new theatre piece that even Kevin Bourke is raving about?”

The Library Theatre’s annual Re:Play Festival is, to some extent, an effort to address this problem, gathering together on the Library Theatre stage some of the best new theatre seen in Manchester and Salford’s non-traditional theatre venues over the last year.

This year’s Re:Play, the third such public-spirited festival, opens on January 26 with a performance of No Wonder by Claire Urwin, presented by Heart Off Guard Theatre Company, who describe the play as, “A fairytale for people who’ve stopped reading fairytales”.

It was first seen at the 24:7 festival, as were three of the other Re:Play productions, including 5:30, nominated for two awards in December’s M.E.N Theatre Awards.

Altogether, six different plays, plus four short plays selected from the two JB Shorts events (also M.E.N Theatre Award nominated) at Joshua Brooks in Manchester in 2009, will be performed three times in Re:Play 2010.

Intense

FirstStage, a new ideas workshop, and the Re:Play Debate, a discussion on the city’s independent theatre scene, complete the programme of events in the festival, running until February 6.

“Our first two festivals in 2008 and 2009 were both huge successes,” says the Library Theatre’s artistic director, Chris Honer, who headed the panel which selected the plays, agreeing that, “Re:Play is a marvellous opportunity to see some exciting productions which theatre-goers might well have missed first time round.”

Next week, there’ll be opportunities to see No Wonder (on Tuesday at 7pm; Wednesday at 9pm; and Thursday at 7pm), as well as Alistair McDowall’s superb 5:30 (Tuesday at 9pm; Wednesday at 7pm; and Thursday at 9pm).

There’ll also be another opportunity to catch the 24:7 hit Cell, by Ailis Ni Riain, an intense but witty look at a day in the life of a bright but damaged young man who lives as a recluse in his parents’ house. It’s on Thursday at 3pm; Friday at 9pm; and Saturday at 7pm.

Throughout the rest of the festival, you can see Billy Cowan’s Care Takers, Simon Stephens’ Herons, Ed Jones’ Exit Salford and the JB Shorts Bundle, all of which we’ll be looking at more fully next week, along with the FirstStage and Re:Play Debate events.

For more information or to book tickets, call 0161 236 7110 or visit www.librarytheatre.com.