Epic Theatre Ensemble

11 students from public High Schools of Chelsea, Bronx, and Harlem will travel to Scotland to perform a play about educational equity. The group was invited to be part of the 2016 edition of the National Theatre of Scotland’s International Theater Festival.

  These young men and women, part of New York’s Epic Theatre Ensemble program Epic NEXT, will perform 10467, the award winner play that discusses the efficacy of the current model of public education in the United States. Directed by Ron Russell, 10467 is a powerful, inspiring play written and performed by research-informed public school students who are changing the script and mobilizing New Yorkers to "stand up" for educational equity.

  The National Theatre of Scotland’s International Theater Festival will be the perfect venue to explore how arts and education can work together for a better community. The event will bring together groups of young theatre-makers (aged 16 to 25 years old) from Scotland and across the world, to facilitate a national and international exchange and to enable the groups to create and perform new pieces of theater with the help and support of a professional creative team. Ten groups of young theatre-makers have been selected to take part in Exchange 2016; eight groups from Scotland and two international groups including New York’s Epic Theatre Ensemble.

  The groups are supported artistically and financially in the creation of an original work of quality contemporary theatre. Each theatre piece is initially performed in the group’s home area before it is staged as part of the week-long Exchange festival at Macrobert Arts Centre in July 2016. During that residential week on campus at the University of Stirling, participating groups are encouraged to develop their skills through stimulating master-classes and workshops with leading national and international theatre-makers. 

  About Epic NEXT

The National Theatre of Scotland in partnership with Macrobert Arts Centre presents Exchange 2016 Macrobert Arts Centre, Stirling from 4 to 10 July 2016

The National Theatre of Scotland’s international theatre festival for 16 to 25 year old. Now in its eighth year, the National Theatre of Scotland’s vibrant Exchange programme brings together groups of young theatre-makers (aged 16 to 25 years old) from Scotland and across the world, to facilitate a national and international exchange and to enable the groups to create and perform new pieces of theatre with the help and support of a professional creative team. Ten groups of young theatre-makers have been selected to take part in Exchange 2016; eight groups from Scotland and two international groups including New York’s Epic Theatre Ensemble.

The groups are each supported artistically and financially in the creation of an original work of quality contemporary theatre. The creative partners for this instalment of Exchange are Colin Bradie and Fiona Manson. Each theatre piece is initially performed in the group’s home area before it is staged as part of the week-long Exchange festival at Macrobert Arts Centre in July 2016. During that residential week on campus at the University of Stirling, participating groups are encouraged to develop their skills through stimulating master-classes and workshops with leading national and international theatre-makers. The popular Exchange TV returns for a fourth year.

The Scottish theatre groups taking part in Exchange 2016 are:

• Beacon Youth Theatre, Inverclyde • Collision Theatre, Buckhaven • Creative Electric in collaboration with Dance Base and #Artcore, Edinburgh • Eden Court Collective, Inverness • Ignite Theatre, Glasgow • Macrobert Collective, Stirling • Paperdog (Firefly Arts Youth Theatre), West Lothian • Strange Town, Edinburgh

The international groups taking part in Exchange 2016 are:

• Epic Theatre Ensemble, Harlem, Manhattan, USA • Massive Company, Auckland, New Zealand

National Theatre of Scotland's Learning and Outreach Manager Gillian Gourlay says:

“From its inception in 2006, I have been delighted to see how not only the festival itself has grown and flourished, but also how the young theatre -makers involved have developed over the years, raising the bar year on year. To be able to bring such a mix of ideas, talent and enthusiasm together from all over the world, and to see them immerse themselves in sharing and creating their own form of theatre, is just amazing to witness. Exchange is an opportunity for everyone to bring something with them to the festival as well as to go away with not just new skills and experiences, but genuine friendships too - and you just can’t buy that.”

Venue: Macrobert Arts Centre, Stirling Performances:  Two groups each evening at 7.30pm and 9.00pm from 5 to 9 July 2016.

ABOUT THE YOUTH THEATRES

Beacon Youth Theatre (BYT) in Greenock is led by Andy McGregor and Marianne Yeomans, who specialise in facilitating, making and directing theatre with children and young people. This dynamic and creative group is always adventurous, making every one of their performances unique.  They may decide to take audiences on journeys into fantastical worlds or they may have a burning desire to explore social media and its effects on young people. Whatever topic, story or genre, the group decides the creative process will always be a collaborative one. Participants are encouraged to use their imagination, share ideas, tell real life stories and together they make them come alive on stage.

Collision is a collective of Fife-based young theatre makers and is produced by Claire Bloomfield. They create work that responds to the everyday and explores the world in which they live.

Since its inception in 2013, Collision has presented work at The Royal Lyceum Theatre, Rose Theatre London, Edinburgh International Fringe Festival, the Glasgow 2014 Cultural Programme, Glasgow, various theatres across Scotland, and in non-traditional performance spaces, including parks and nursing homes. The company has created work with the National Theatre of Scotland, the Royal National Theatre of Great Britain, Kingston International Youth Arts Festival, Hearts and Minds and Scottish Book Trust.

Creative Electric is a critically-acclaimed, award-winning theatre company, which creates contemporary performance based on real experiences. Often their work is interactive, sometimes it’s personal, at times it’s one-to-one. The company creates socio-political work with an intentional emphasis on the social and an often unintentional emphasis on the political. Creative Electric aims to engage with young people who may not traditionally attend arts events and do so by producing theatre in non-traditional spaces including nightclubs, skate parks, trains, abandoned buildings and even on rooftops. They are currently working with a group of young men aged 16-24 to explore the themes of fragility and masculinity through verbatim and physical theatre supported by Dance Base and Artcore Edinburgh.

Eden Court Collective is a group of young actors from all over the Highlands, who were brought together to participate in a performance project that would challenge us as young performers and theatre makers. We are an exciting, talented, modest, friendly, cooperative and awesome group of young people. We are up for anything and we are all committed to being part of something brilliant, pushing creative boundaries and challenging the common expectations of what youth theatre can be. We were first brought together in 2014 for a project called A Century Untold, and we are delighted that Exchange 2016 is our next challenge.

Epic NEXT is Epic Theatre Ensemble's flagship youth development program, a multi-year mentorship that builds tomorrow's American arts leaders.  Epic NEXT transforms young economically-disadvantaged artists from passive participants into agents of change – first of their ways of thinking and working, then of their personal academic and economic situations, then of the inertia endemic to their communities.  Through in-depth mentorship with professional artists, skill-building courses during a six-week annual Summer Intensive, opportunities to create relevant performance pieces on social issues, and in-depth college preparation, Epic NEXT participants enter college with the drive and capacity to use theatre to change their world.  

Firefly provides quality theatre, film and arts activity in venues across West Lothian, working with over 300 children and young people each week. Our programme embraces classic and contemporary text, new writing, devised, physical and multi-media work. Recent productions have included devised pieces These Shores and Humming for Contact and Chrysalis festivals, adaptations of Kafka’s Metamorphosis, Aristophanes’ Women in Power, Golding’s Lord of the Flies and Molière’s Tartuffe.

Ignite Theatre was founded in 2010 by writer/director Aileen Ritchie and an original group of young asylum seekers and refugees, and is an award-winning Glasgow based charity which engages with a diverse range of children and young people who face multiple challenges in life. Through free weekly workshops and innovative drama projects, Ignite Theatre offers its members a supported environment in which they can fulfill their creative potential, develop confidence, forge new friendships and build their life skills.

Located at the heart of the University of Stirling, Macrobert Arts Centre is a cultural hub for Stirling, the Forth Valley and Scotland. With a vision is to promote and develop participation in, and enjoyment of, the arts, the organisation offers a huge variety of activities with over 400 live performances - comedy, dance, drama, exhibitions, family shows, music, opera - a range of opportunities for all ages to get involved and a year round cinema programme. Macrobert Arts Centre also produces and co-produces award-winning new work and is acknowledged as a producer of quality productions for younger audiences, working in partnership with other companies and artists.

Macrobert Collective is an exciting new opportunity for talented young people from Stirling and the Forth Valley to get involved. Created especially for National Theatre of Scotland Exchange 2016 by Macrobert Arts Centre, this new company is open to 16 to 25 year olds.

Massive Company is a professional theatre company with youth at our heart and is a recognised leader in developing emerging performing artists in New Zealand. Specialising in creating new theatre for emerging and professional actors, the work performed by Massive springboards from real New Zealand stories and real people, and expresses authentic emotions. Our work is curious, playful, inventive and energised.

At the core of the company is Massive Nui Ensemble a committed group of emerging artists who are selected to develop, create and perform dynamic and personal theatre pieces. From this group Massive will bring 6 cast members to perform at Exchange 2016. 2016 will be the 25th year since Massive Company was founded by artistic director Sam Scott MNZM. The company’s work has reached critical acclaim both in New Zealand and overseas. Some highlights have been touring Sons of Charlie Paora to The Royal Court in London; touring Up Close Out Loud to Contacting The World Festival in Manchester; Touring their acclaimed work The Brave to Hawaii in 2015.

Our PaperDog company is committed to making dynamic and exploratory performance, developing contemporary practice that both combines and deconstructs theatrical form, creating work that is physically and visually arresting, and universally readable. PaperDog performers are keen to take risks and challenge boundaries.

New York City: With a performance of a sonnet and monologue from Shakespeare on stage at Lincoln Center in New York City, ABEL GARCIA from New York, NY, an Epic NEXT student of Gabriel Silva at The Urban Assembly School for the Performing Arts in New York, won a place as one of the 10 finalists in the 33 National Shakespeare Competition. The Competition took place on May 2, 2016 with 55 semi-finalists from as many ESU Branch competitions nationwide. Abel previously won the ESU New York Branch competition.

The 2016 English-Speaking Union National Shakespeare Competition is part of Shakespeare400, the international yearlong celebration of Shakespeare’s works. This year, the Competition marked the milestone of exceeding 300,000 student participants since its inception in 1983. Among the winners and finalists of the Competition who have gone on to national acclaim are actor and director Joe Sofranko, whose Hulu series Complete Works is, in fact, based on the National Shakespeare Competition; actors Emily Bergl (Shameless, Desperate Housewives, Southland); Tyler Hilton (Walk the Line, One Tree Hill); Heather Lind (Demolition, Boardwalk Empire, Turn: Washington’s Spies); Bronwyn Reed (Law and Order: SVU); as well as Broadway’s Matt Harrington (Twelfth Night, Matilda) and Adam Wesley Brown (Once the Musical).

This winner of the 33rd English-Speaking Union National Shakespeare Competition, Ari Dalbert, representing the Hawai’i Branch, received a full scholarship to attend the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art’s Young Actors Summer School in London, England, this summer. Second place winner, Zoë Oliver, from Greenwich Branch, won a scholarship to attend the American Shakespeare Center Theatre Camp in Staunton, VA, while the third place winner, Cecilia Harchegani, representing the San Diego Branch of the ESU, received $500 from The Shakespeare 33rd annual English-Speaking Union

This year, actress Dana Ivey served as a judge, joining an illustrious roster of former judges that includes such luminaries as Sarah Jessica Parker, Sam Waterston, Phylicia Rashad, Blythe Danner, Jesse L. Martin, Cynthia Nixon, Richard Thomas, Courtney B. Vance, Dianne Wiest, and Helen Hayes.

The English-Speaking Union National Shakespeare Competition is a school-based program designed to help students develop their speaking and critical thinking skills and their appreciation of literature as they explore the beauty of Abel Garcia ESU National Shakespeare Competition Finalist the language and timeless themes in Shakespeare’s works. In three progressive competition levels, students memorize, interpret, and perform monologues and sonnets in their own schools, at ESU Branch-sponsored community competitions and at the English-Speaking Union National Shakespeare Competition. Citing its 33rd season this year, the Honorable Bill De Blasio, Mayor of the City of New York, proclaimed May 2, 2016 as William Shakespeare Day in New York City. Danny Lopez, the British Consul-General in New York, read the proclamation, and Paul Beresford-Hill, CBE, KSt.J, Chairman of the English-Speaking Union, awarded certificates to the competitors. The ESU provided the semi-finalists with two full days of educational and cultural activities in New York City, including an exclusive acting workshop at the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University and a performance of the Something Rotten! on Broadway. Perhaps best of all for these teenagers was the opportunity to spend a weekend in New York City with other students from across the country who share a love of the English language and, particularly, Shakespeare.

Source: The English-Speaking UnionNational Shakespeare Competition

New York City, March 11, 2016 – With his performance of Angelo from Measure for Measure and his recitation of Shakespeare Sonnet 138, Abel Garcia, a student of Gabriel Silva at Urban Assembly School for the Performing Arts in Manhattan, won the 2016 English-Speaking Union New York Shakespeare Competition.

Celebrating the Shakespeare400 legacy, the ESU New York Shakespeare Competition took place on March 10th on the stage of the Gilder Lehrman Hall at the Morgan Library & Museum, where twelve finalists from New York City area high schools (selected from among more than 70 contestants) competed.

They presented selections from the Bard’s works hoping to represent New York in the ESU National Shakespeare Competition on May 1-3, 2016 at Lincoln Center Theater and compete with winners of some 60 ESU competitions nationwide. Mr. Garcia received a cash prize of $200 from The Shakespeare Society and two tickets for a performance of Henry V at BAM.

Na'Shay Kelly from Bronx High School for Writing and Communication Arts placed second, winning $200 from The Shakespeare Society and two tickets to Theatre for a New Audience's production of Pericles. Esther Ritchin from White Plains High School captured third place, winning $100 from The Shakespeare Society and two tickets to Peer Gynt at the Classic Stage Company.

The remaining finalists were Fiona Calberson (Townsend Harris High School at CUNY/ Queens College); Chassidy David (Talent Unlimited High School); Alessandro Lopez (Williamsburg Preparatory High School); John Nuñez (Hillcrest High School); Davion Osbourne (Chelsea Career & Technical Education High School); Olivia Reis (Elisabeth Irwin High School / LREI); Jelani Richards-Cantave (Cardinal Spellman High School); Diana

Vasilevski (Brooklyn Technical High School); and Dylan Weber (Long Island School for the Gifted). Dr. Paul Beresford-Hill, Chairman of the English-Speaking Union, thanked all the contestants remarking favorably on the talent, energy, and enthusiasm each displayed for the works of the Bard.

Judges for the competition included Peter Avery (Director of Theater, New York City Department of Education), Mary E. Hodges (Actor, Harlem Shakespeare Festival), Katie Miller (Education Director, Theatre for a New Audience), Michael Sexton (Artistic Director, The Shakespeare Society) and Dr. Robert Young (Former Director of Education, The Folger Shakespeare Library). BAM, Classic Stage Company, The Morgan Library & Museum, the New York Public Library, The Shakespeare Society, and Theatre for a New Audience provided valuable support for the New York Branch Shakespeare Competition.

ESU New York Shakespeare Competition 2016 Finalists Christopher Broadwell, Executive Director of the English-Speaking Union, welcomed the contestants, their parents, teachers and friends, to the Competition, noting that this year the entire world is celebrating the legacy of William Shakespeare. He said, “The English-Speaking Union, a leader in Shakespeare education in America, and is also celebrating Shakespeare 400 legacy through the hundreds of thousands of students, teachers and members who have participating in our National Shakespeare Competition, workshops and classes for educators in the US and UK, and lectures and events across the country.”

The English-Speaking Union National Shakespeare Competition is a school-based program designed to develop speaking skills, critical thinking and an appreciation of literature in students throughout the United States. It is the only national Shakespeare competition in the country and the only such program exclusively for high school students. Students read, analyze, perform and recite Shakespeare monologues and sonnets in three qualifying stages: at the school, community and national levels. Since its inception in New York City in 1983, the program has engaged more than 300,000 young people. The program currently reaches 21,200 students and 2,400 teachers in 60 English-Speaking Union Branch communities across the United States. The Competition has been recognized by the Globe Center (USA), the Children’s Theatre Foundation of America and the American Academy of Achievement.