The South Devon Players Theatre & Film Company News

Macbeth shows dates coming this autumn.

2/7/2019

We are just checking in to update you on the shows. Tickets are now on sale for our performaces in Brixham, Ivybridge, Bristol and Exeter - and we would llove to see you there. We are working on booking more venues around the UK, so there may be more to come.

You can find the booking links at https://www.southdevonplayers.com/box-office.htmlwww.southdevonplayers.com/box-office.html

The South Devon Players win theatre award in New York

11/6/2019

Brixham-based South Devon Players Theatre & Film Company were thrilled to find out, in the early hours of June 11th 2019, (late evening June 10th New York time) that they had won a theatre award in the Long Island Theatre Awards ceremony for their production of Shakespeare's classic drama of ambition, power and fate; Macbeth.
The show, first performed by the Players in January and February 2019, was not without its own share of drama, when the title role for the show needed to be recast ten days before the first performances.

Christophe Lombardi, a friend of the Players, took up the mantle, learning the role and arriving from Ireland, in Devon for the final two rehearsals, to star alongside Ryanna-Mae Lloyd as Lady Macbeth and a team of dedicated local actors.
The show, performed at Brixham Theatre, the South Devon Players home performance venue, and then at Torquay Museum, attracted record positive feedback from audience and critics, with feedback such as that it surpassed productions by the Globe in London, and the RSC.
Hot on the heels of this success, came requests for a second larger show tour, including from Ireland and the USA, and a request from the Long Island Theatre Awards to enter the production for their 2019 awards. They were happy to accept a video submission of the show filmed at Brixham Theatre.
Months later came the news, that the Players were among the award nominees, and a request from the Theatre Awards administrators to send a representative to New York. The Players were by this time working hard on their scheduled production of Les Miserables, with the plans underway for an autumn tour reprising Macbeth. Laura Jury, the South Devon Players founder and director of both Macbeth and Les Miserables, was unable to attend, but Christophe once more took up the mantle and travelled to New York, collecting the award on behalf of the Players, which will be brought back to Devon during the next week or so, as he travels back from the USA.
Brixham Theatre was saved from closure in 2018 by a team of local volunteers, and it provides a critical base for local creativity, without which, successes like this, would not be possible for local people in their hometown. The Players owe this success to the continued existence of Brixham Theatre.
The Players are now also beginning rehearsals for the second tour of Macbeth; keeping most of the original cast, including Ryanna-Mae Lloyd and Christophe Lombardi as the Macbeths; although also excited to welcome new performers as well. The tour is currently booked into Brixham, Ivybridge, Exeter and Bristol, with discussions underway to bring the show to London, and further venues, during the autumn of 2019. While plans for touring abroad had to be put on hold due to being unable to find funding to do so, this has no way dampened the team's desire to bring the show to regular and new venues here in the UK, and to revisit attempts to tour abroad in the future.
Macbeth is one of Shakespeare's best known dramas, alongside King Lear, Othello, Hamlet, and Romeo & Juliet. It tells the tale of a Scottish war hero, who, tempted by ambition, power, and supernatural whisperings, begins a series of murders, to take and hold the throne. Returning home from war, Macbeth encounters three mysterious women, whose prophecy of kingship, sets in motion his ambition, and ultimately his fall into madness and blood...
The Players perform the original, uncut Shakespearian text, set in the dark aftermath of a nuclear WW3, in a post-apocalyptic design, with the exotic of the supernatural, and immersive soundscapes, to create Macbeths world in a new vision of the drama.
The South Devon Players, founded in 2005/6 on the proceeds of a carboot sale, and still funded in much the same way, are winners of the national Epic Award 2017 for England, a national arts award celebrating creativity and innovation in grassroots arts, and international nominations for past productions. Based in Brixham, the Players primarily specialise in researched historical theatre productions and old “Classics”.

£3 ticket offer to schools - Macbeth at Brixham Theatre

14/5/2019

Read more about the show with links to photos and videos: HERE

After being contacted by a school from Newton Abbott, for a special weekday matinee performance for thier students, and the education working group within the Brixham Theatre trustees, agreeing to provide the theatre venue for free for this event, we are able to provide cheap £3 tickets for school trips to see this production. This is a full performance of the unabridged original text followed by a Q&A.

We have 100 seats filled thus far, and have another 140 seats available. After discussions with both the existant school attending, and the theatre trustees, we would like to offer these other seats, at the same price to other schools - or homeschool groups - who would also like to attend and take advantage of this offer. These may be booked in total, or in part.

This event is not open to the public.

In order to book some, or all of the remaining seats, please contact our company directly on southdevonplayers@gmail.com, for full information and to book.

We can also provide photos, scripts etc if required, as well as accessiblity information for the show and the venue.

Tickets on sale for Macbeth in Ivybridge

10/5/2019

Great news!

TICKET LINK: https://ivybridgewatermark.ticketsolve.com/shows/1173593965

Performing William Shakespeare's original unabridged text, the award-winning South Devon Players Theatre & Film Company, homegrown in Brixham, bring this drama to life in an all-new production. This classic tale of ambition, destiny and murder takes place in the near future, dramatized across a post-WW3 landscape, performed by a strong team of local professional actors.

This show was performed in Jan/ Feb 2019 around Devon, to five star reviews and is currently nominated for a theatre award in New York.

Winners of the 2017 Epic Award for England, an annual national award for groundbreaking innovation and creativity in the arts, the South Devon Players specialise in high-quality productions based on classical texts, and researched history, developing and showcasing the talent of actors and other creatives from around South Devon.

Ivybridge performance will take place on
Friday September 13th 2019 - 7.30pm, at
The Watermark,
Leonards Road,
Ivybridge,
Devon PL21 0SZ
TEL: 01752 892220

Tickets £10 (£8 child/ concession)

CONTENT
- Moderate bloodshed
- No strong sexual content
- No strong language

The South Devon Players Shakespeare production nominated for theatre award in New York.

24/4/2019

Brixham based theatre company's Shakespeare production nominated for theatre award in New York.
Following a hugely successful production of William Shakespeare's Macbeth this winter, the South Devon Players have been nominated for a theatre award in New York, specifically the Long Island Lighthouse Theatre Awards, in the Theatre Partner Award category, specifically for productions outside the Long Island Nassau County area. As a company who (by force of circumstance, with the difficulty of finding funding in the local theatre sector) work on profit share from ticket sales to our cast and crew, we fall somewhere between the voluntary and full salary sectors, and therefore are eligible for this award. The VTAA , who sponsor this award are mainly US based (but open internationally) and are the "Equity for voluntary and low paid theatre" of which we have been an organisational member for several years.
During January and February 2019, the South Devon Players performed a post-apocalyptic set production of William Shakespeare's Macbeth. Completely unabridged and unchanged from the original text, other than being set in a post World War 3 near-future, this production attracted such audience feedback as

“The power of the final scene was such that the audience sat transfixed in silence, barely able to comprehend the beauty of what they’d just witnessed. “

“Easily on a par with the production of Macbeth we saw at the Globe”
The show was almost called off, after the lead role needed to be recast with less than 10 days before opening night. French/Irish actor Christophe Lombardi stepped in, learned the role in a matter of days and travelled to the UK to take the role, alongside Ryanna-Mae Lloyd as Lady Macbeth, with a powerful team of actors; and techs.

Despite this crisis, the show attracted fantastic audience feedback, from the shows at both Brixham Theatre & Torquay Museum, swiftly followed by invitations for more shows in the UK, and abroad. While work continues to get the team out to the venues abroad, the team are taking up the show invitations in the UK, at Ivybridge's Watermark theatre, and Exeter's Barnfield Theatre and are also booking additional dates at the end of the summer and during the autumn of 2019.

At Brixham Theatre, the show was filmed by a local filmmaker, and the resultant film was submitted to the 2019 Long Island Community Theatre Awards. The South Devon Players were informed on April 24th 2014, that the production of Macbeth was nominated for; the outcome of the awards will be finally known on June 10th in the evening, New York time.

The South Devon Players, founded in 2005/6 on the proceeds of a carboot sale, and funded in much the same way, are already winners of the national Epic Award 2017 for England, a national arts award celebrating creativity and innovation in grassroots arts, and international nominations for past productions. Based in Brixham, the Players pride themselves on supportive, friendly, and ambitious grassroots team of professional and aspiring professional actors at all stages of their careers, who primarily specialise in researched historical theatre productions and Classics, to provide an opportunity for local people to develop their skills in creating shows to a national standard, in order to develop internationally recognised professional skills, portfolios and credits.

They always welcome new performers and creatives who would like to get involved. The Players are working hard to be able to offer more education, steady employment, and more regular shows at an international standard.
Laura Jury (Director) studied performing arts at South Devon College, then a Bachelors degree in film & TV production from the University of Plymouth, before progressing to a Masters in teaching theatre from Exeter University With a history of performing since 1996, and directing since 2000, in between her training she has also pursued a career as a professional performer, and in 2006 founded the now multi award-winning South Devon Players Theatre & Film Company with three others, to create new projects in Torbay.

Great news for Macbeth

16/4/2019

Fantastic news - by audience request, and word of mouth, we have been asked to reprise our post-apocalyptic, original uncut text production of William Shakespeares Macbeth. While contracts are still being sorted out, tickets will be on sale soon.
We have been invited to venues in Europe as well, for this show, and it is all depending on Brexit and funding to try and get out to those venues as well, but the UK shows are being booked up like crazy.
This is such a fantastic piece of recognition for all our amazing team members.
Watch this space for announcements soon, on upcoming ticket sales!
www.southdevonplayers.com

Macbeth full show video is now online!

4/3/2019

For people who were too far afield to come to see our stage show of Macbeth, it is now on Youtube!

Feedback and Reviews for our production of Macbeth in Torquay

12/2/2019

Our production of Macbeth at Torquay went as well as the Brixham shows did, with more excellent feedback. A local newspaper reporter, Bob Jope, attended to review the production - here is a link to his glowing review:
Macbeth in Torbay
while other audience feedback and reviews on social media was just as encouraging.

It was also an exciting first for us, as the actor/ technician Dorothy Laity Lombardi attended to run our lights. It was fantastic to work with her - and to meet her theatre-trained service dog, Emma. Dorothy and Emma proved without a shadow of doubt just what an amazing team they were!
(photos below of rehearsals, and preparation for the Torquay performances - and featuring Emma!)

Welcoming Christophe.

8/1/2019

We would like to welcome to our Macbeth team, the French-Irish actor Christophe Lombardi, Actor, who has been a member of the Players for some time, along with his wife. Christophe trained at Les Cours Simon in Paris, and has since appeared in numerous TV programmes for the BBC, the Smithsonian, Universal and Netflix. He is also a living history performer and fight choreographer. There is some incredible work underway to prepare, and all is going smoothly and very well. He recently appeared in a production with Ivybridge Community Arts, The Armistice (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6gGIc87LUmg), and is a regular actor with Trapdoor Entertainment.
Photos (not from Macbeth!) are by Roger Kenny, from the Irish TV programme Prisoners of the Tower, and Dorothy Grace Laity Lombardi and the montage is from various productions, all as supplied by Dorothy Grace Laity Lombardi.
We are thrilled to be working with this fantastic actor, and cant wait to introduce him to Brixham theatre audiences, hopefully the first of many times in future.

Macbeth show dates thus far announced

18/9/2018

Performing Shakspeares original text, this production will be on at Brixham Theatre with public performances
Friday January 18th 2019 (evening)
Saturday January 19th 2019 (matinee and evening)

then at Torquay Museum
Friday February 1st 2019 (evening)
Saturday February 2nd 2019 (matinee & evening)

Tickets will go on sale during October 2018, along with an exciting video trailer and cast photos.

And, just because the team are doing so well, here are some more behind the scenes photos from rehearsals