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March 12, 2008

International Festival of New Plays

N.T. NEW CONNECTIONS: INTERNATIONAL NEW PLAYS FESTIVAL

NT New Connections Festival of New Plays Kildare Youth Theatre @ Crooked House, in association with the National Theatre of Britain (sponsored by Bank of America)

Tuesday 25th – Saturday 29th March 2008 | 8pm | €14/€10 | groups and student offers available | Box Office 045 448333.

Riverbank Arts Centre, Main Street, Newbridge, County Kildare

This is the sixth annual international collaboration between Britain’s National Theatre and KYT, a partnership that produced memorable new work by Mark Ravenhill, Jon Fosse, Enda Walsh, Ursula Rani Sarma and Lin Coghlan amongst others. Each year the National commissions 10 new plays from internationally recognised writers and over 200 youth theatres across Britain and Ireland perform them. This year, the Newbridge festival will showcase work from 3 of the writers in Irish premiere performances, and a rehearsed reading of a play from Italian writer Fausto Paravidino.

This season's festival will bring to a total of 22 new plays from the Connections portfolios premiered by Kildare Youth Theatre since 2002, making it the single largest producer of new work in the NT Connections history.

'Scenes from Family Life' by MARK RAVENHILL
Directed by Keith Burke

’Burying Your Brother in the Pavement’ by JACK THORNE
Directed by Mary Duffin

’A Vampire Story’ by MOIRA BUFFINI
Directed by Peter Hussey, Artistic Director of Crooked House Theatre Company, Ireland

 and a rehearsed reading of

‘Nuts’ by FAUSTO PARAVIDINO from the 2002 NT Connections Portfolio.
Directed by Michele Panella,Associate Director of  Teatro della Limonaia, Florence and Artistic Director of Grupo Tri-boo, Florence

SCENES FROM FAMILY LIFE by MARK RAVENHILL
Jack and Lisa: two ordinary teenagers who want to have a baby. Only problem is Lisa keeps vanishing –literally - into thin air. Their friends Barry and Stacy have the same problem. Stacy is eight months pregnant. But Barry keeps vanishing in front of her eyes.  Soon, they discover that first their friends and eventually the whole world are dematerializing. With Lisa and Barry faded away to nothing, Jack’s flat is requisitioned by the army and given over to a parents and babies group. But when finally everyone else vanishes for good, there’s only Jack and Stacy left in the world. It’s up to Jack to deliver Stacy’s baby.
Six months on and Jack and Stacy are the only boy and girl on the planet. For Jack it’s a dream, for Stacy a nightmare. And when the vanished start to return, Jack has to learn how complex adult relationships are. Directed by Keith Burke.

BURYING YOUR BROTHER IN THE PAVEMENT by JACK THORNE
Tom's brother is dead. He was killed by a broken bottle to the neck... This has upset a lot people..... it hasn’t upset Tom. Or, rather, it has upset him, but in ways he can't explain and in ways his aunties – who keep trying to thrust snack products at him – would never understand. You see, Tom and his brother, Luke, were never friends, were never really much at all, I mean, Tom really didn’t like Luke, but without him... So it’s an odd decision – to try and bury Luke in the pavement of the Tunstall Estate – to try and bury him at the point where he was brutally murdered – but, you know, it sort of makes sense. In a kind of upside-down, monkey-type way.

As he goes through due process on pavement burial, Tom comes across planning officials, tramps, undertakers, police officers, sisters, mothers, estate agents, ghosts, pavement elephants, sky dragons and a strange lad called Tight who wants to sell him a travel-card.
This is a play about grief, and looking at someone that little bit more closely – oh, and there are a few songs, bits of dancing, and lots of weird things involving sofas. Directed By Mary Duffin.

A VAMPIRE STORY by MOIRA BUFFINI
Two young women arrive in a nameless British small-town. Their names are not their own. They don’t declare their ages. Their relationship with each other is not clear. Are they sisters, as their assumed identities declare? Or are they mother and daughter? The eldest, Claire, takes a job in a pub. The youngest, Eleanor, goes to school.

During a truth exercise in her drama class, Eleanor confesses that she has been alive for over two hundred yeas and has survived by drinking human blood. Her classmates think she is utterly crazy and Mint, her teacher, puts her in touch with the school counsellor. She makes one friend, Frank, a boy who has been home educated and is as much of an oddity as Eleanor. He tries to get to the bottom of her vampire delusion, thinking it an epic and compelling psychosis. Why would anyone want to be undead? Frank's parents believe that Ella is an anorexic - why does she never eat?

Eleanor has started to write her life story as a play. She describes Claire’s background as a prostitute in 19th century London and her own as a child in a private orphanage. Meanwhile, things are falling apart. People are disappearing. Are Eleanor and Claire vampires? Or are they troubled young women on the run? Directed by Peter Hussey.

Tuesday 25th March
8.00pm: A Devised Play by Kildare Youth Theatre and a visiting production from Independent Youth Theatre, Ranelagh.

Wednesday 26th March
8.00pm: Burying Your Brother in the Pavement. 9.00pm: A Vampire Story.

Thursday 27th March
8.00pm: Scenes From Family Life. 9.00pm: Burying Your Brother in the Pavement.

Friday 28th March
8.00pm: A Vampire Story. 9.00pm: Scenes From Family Life.

Saturday 29th March
3.00pm: A rehearsed reading of NUTS by Fausto Paravidino, directed by Italian director Michele Panella

8.00pm: Burying Your Brother in the Pavement. 9.00pm: A Vampire Story.

Further details on www.riverbank.ie and on www.crookedhouse.ie and on www.ntconnections.org.uk

Event details on http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=10556680627&ref=nf

Company details on www.kildareyouththeatre.bebo.com and www.crookedhouse.ie