Theatre-Rites, Trailblazing Children's Theatre

Children’s theatre is rarely given serious attention by the critics and while it’s true that much of it doesn’t bear scrutiny, there are companies whose work could teach adult theatre a thing or two. Theatre-Rites is the trailblazer of those companies. For the past 14 years it has produced some extraordinarily ambitious work.

Where most children's drama takes place in proscenium-arch theatres with interval ice creams on ready supply, Theatre-Rites produced Salt in a derelict salt factory in Essen. Its award-winning show, Mischief, is slightly more accessible: it is currently touring and can be seen at the Peacock Theatre in London this weekend.

The company was founded in 1995 by Penny Bernand, who worked for many years for Pop-Up, one of the leading children’s theatre companies in the 1980s. Bernand gradually became frustrated with the limitations of working with a script and along with puppeteer Sue Buckmaster and visual artist Sophia Clist began to explore ways of creating work that was more visually driven.  Together they created The Lost and Moated Land, an installation for the under-fives in the Young Vic studio.  A show for the under-fives that wasn’t based on a syndicated character was pretty radical, but it was the company’s next production that was to prove truly groundbreaking.

“Penny and I both thought that there was some very interesting site-specific work going on for adults and that it would be great to do something similar for kids, really tiny kids,” explains Buckmaster, who has been the company’s artistic director since Barnard died of breast cancer in 2001.

The result was Houseworks, part of the 1996 London International Festival of Theatre. Set in an old house in Brixton which was in the process of being renovated by a housing association, groups of children under five were taken on a tour of the building by Ernie, a puppet. A different experience waited behind every door, from the  upside-down room, with furniture hanging from the ceiling to the dark sparkly star-lit room, where children tried to catch whirling stars.

“When the reviews came out we were fending off adults.” says Buckmaster.  “It really changed the way people thought about work for small children.  Until that point, you were pretty much limited to Saturday mornings on somebody else’s set; we proved that you could take over a building and if the show was good enough, the audience would come.”

However, although Houseworks proved there was a demand for imaginative, high-quality work for young audiences, it did little to shift the perception that children’s theatre doesn't merit close inspection.  “Children’s work is often dismissed because it is generally assumed that because a child’s mind is less developed, the creation process must be less a developed process,” comments Buckmaster, “but in fact, a child’s mind is so curious and honest that the process has to be even more rigorous.  Children know when an idea is half-baked; they know when they are being patronised.”  She also points out that a family show is just as much for adults as children.  “You’ve got to find something that will appeal to everyone at some level, including the father who’d rather be on his Blackberry. You have to be very inventive.”

Mischief, which was originally produced in 2007, is the company’s first production for the main stage.  “I’d been knocking on the door of theatre for such a long time,” says Buckmaster, “I really wanted a main stage to play on but it was difficult because our shows emerge from a collaborative rehearsal process so I didn’t have a script to show anyone.  Then Sadler’s Wells asked if we’d be interested in making a family show with a choreographer.”

Buckmaster met with several choreographers but an animated discussion about burlesque with choreographer Arthur Pita convinced her she had found the right person.  “The best burlesque is about being teased and made to laugh and feel a bit naughty.  It’s a way of engaging with the audience, which is something that dancers don’t always do but Arthur understood completely.  It felt like the right way to go.”

Pita admits to feeling initially a little apprehensive about the project.  “I’d only seen really bad children’s theatre before, you know the sort of thing, with people prancing around in waistcoats and I didn’t want to be part of anything like that.  Plus, when I usually go into a rehearsal I have a schedule and a storyboard and I know more or less what I’m going to do, so the idea of making it up as we went along was quite intimidating.  But the moment we kicked off, I started to see the possibilities and I thought, ‘Oh, this is going to be joyous, liberating.'  And it was.”

Mischief consists of six dancers, with a range of skills from hip-hop to classical, who interact with each other and Clist’s various lengths of brightly coloured foam along to Charlie Winston’s jaunty music. Parallels are created between the dancers’ bendy bodies and the bendy foam, which also becomes a myriad of objects, animals and exotic locations where adventures can take place. It is a deceptively simple conceit, beautiful to look at, extremely bombastic and fun, and yet there are also poignant moments of loss and tenderness that gives it an emotional dynamic.

Buckmaster always has at least three projects on the go, one of which is always “in my head,” but admits she is looking forward to the company taking on larger projects.  “I like working with a large-scale ensemble because the collaboration is richer and more challenging for me.  It drives me crazy but I love that; it forces me to go to new places.”

Mischief is at the Sadler’s Wells/Peacock Theatre 10 and 11 October; West Yorkshire Playhouse 29 and 30 October; Dundee Rep 4 November. Book here.