The Scene

Janno Media

The Scene Podcast is a series of little plays brought to you by Janno Media and Get Over It Productions.

  1. 10 Aug

    The Scene X Camden Fringe - ORWELL: The Road To 1984

    This moving and powerful one-man play is a timely portrait of a writer whose words remain a warning - and a hope. George Orwell is perhaps the most influential English writer of the twentieth century.  His classic tales Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four which warn of the dangers of totalitarianism - erosion of free speech, abuse of power, increasing control of all aspects of our everyday lives - resonate now more than ever. Orwell’s dystopian concepts such as 'Big Brother is watching you', 'Room 101' and 'thoughtcrime' have become everyday phrases. But where did his vision of the future come from?  Actor MARK STRATFORD takes you on a fascinating journey through the extraordinary experiences that shaped the work of this perceptive and compelling writer.  In Orwell’s words, we travel through many of the remarkable episodes in his life including his time at a grim boarding school, being a police officer in colonial Burma, his adventures tramping through England to live among the poor and underprivileged, and his extraordinarily close shave with death in the Spanish Civil War. Mark has previously performed at the Camden Fringe in his one-man plays The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (which he adapted from the novella by Robert Louis Stevenson) and Macready! Dickens’ Theatrical Friend (which tells the fascinating true story of the great Victorian actor-manager, William Charles Macready – the man to whom Dickens dedicated Nicholas Nickelby). He's currently part-way through a tour of ORWELL: The Road to 1984 which is being performed at pub theatres, literary festivals and studio venues all over England. In this age of misinformation, political extremism and digital surveillance this is certainly a play for our time!

  2. 10 Aug

    The Scene X Camden Fringe - In Our Broken Hours

    In Our Broken Hours is a play about the cost of caring for someone you love. Mack, a middleaged, unemployed alcoholic, drifts through life from one bottle to the next, unable to confront the damage his dependency has caused. His daughter Emma increasingly finds herself in the role of carer; a role she never asked for and cannot easily step away from. As the play unfolds, their relationship strains under the weight of memory and responsibility. Moments of tenderness sit alongside frustration and fear, and Emma’s unconditional love for her father is tested as addiction begins to reshape the foundations of their family. Drawing on lived experience, the play explores a dynamic that will be familiar to many: the push and pull between care and selfpreservation, and the emotional labour carried by those who love someone in the grip of dependency. A Youngish Perspective awarded it four stars, describing it as “not simply a play about addiction but a study of the stories families tell themselves in order to keep going.” Produced by Falstaff Theatrical, In Our Broken Hours stars Simon Ashton and Giulia Rose as Mack and Emma. Written and directed by Alex Viveash. Falstaff Theatrical focuses on new writing and contemporary drama. The company develops intimate, characterdriven work exploring the complexities of modern life, with a particular interest in the small interactions in life which shape who we are and who we become.

  3. 10 Aug

    The Scene X Camden Fringe - BEIGE

    A story about identity, belonging and the spaces in between. BEIGE is a bold, darkly funny and deeply personal two-woman performance about the violence of being "easy to consume”.  A woman stands before an audience and tries to explain who she is. Not because she wants to, but because she has learned that clarity is currency. Caught between cultures, expectations and labels, she finds herself performing versions of herself for everyone except herself. Blending storytelling, physical theatre and sharp humour, BEIGE explores race, femininity, ambition and mental health, exposing the quiet negotiations we make to be loved, hired, desired and understood. It asks what is lost when we soften our edges, flatten our contradictions and make ourselves more palatable. Raw, playful and confrontational, BEIGE is a reckoning with identity in a world that rewards neutrality, and a celebration of the complexity of being human. It is for anyone who has ever felt caught between worlds, searching for a place to belong. The Wave & Loop is a new London-based theatre company founded by Rebecca Tozzoli-Clozza and Jessica Nlabu, focusing on exploring human connection, mental health, and the ways we see ourselves and the world around us through live performance. We create altered perception through theatre, not as escapism or entertainment, but as a means of generating heightened awareness. Our work invites audiences to move beyond habitual perception, as time, identity and reality subtly destabilise. Engaging with mental health as a series of perceptual loops, we aim to interrupt fixed narratives and open space for new ways of seeing. By disrupting familiar perception, the work mirrors and gently challenges the fixed narratives often present in mental health struggles, offering audiences a new perspective on themselves. CAST Jessica Nlabu Shannon Kurlander CREATIVES Writer: Jessica Nlabu Director: Catherine Mieses Producer & PM: Rebecca Tozzoli-Clozza Lighting & Sound Designer: Nathan Hunt Stage Manager: Jude Chibueze Meju

  4. 10 Aug

    The Scene X Camden Fringe - Motopia

    "Once upon a time, there was a forest, where the sun and the wind and the people ran through the trees with free abandon. Welcome to Motopia!" A new piece of writing, 'Motopia' is a musical choose-your-own adventure play where the choices of the protagonist are placed in the audience’s hands as they navigate their way through The Forest. Imagine the Fighting Fantasy books come to life, or as one audience member put it, “D&D the Musical.”Join Pip as they navigate increasingly complex choices, and the excitement, loss and responsibility that free-will (or lack thereof) brings, leading them to question "What do you do when you don't know what to do?" The audience are equipped with a simple ‘paddle’, one side yellow, the other blue, allowing them to vote on certain choices within the story. “Children’s theatre, but for adults”, the play does not fear the dark but invites the audience to rediscover the trials of adulthood agency through the bright eyes of a naïve adventurer. The world of Motopia is explored through a fairytale lens of childlike wonder, with a cast of five actor-musicians, original music and eccentric characters threaded throughout. Bringing to show to life onstage are Morwenna Brown, Samuel Collins-Webb, Caoimhe de Brún, Sophie Pamment and Adam Pinnock; Joined by the talented Bryony Maguire on Lighting Design and Operation and Lyra Winter as Stage Manager. This is Morwenna Brown’s writing and producing debut. They are very excited to work alongside director and dramaturgist, Anna Wellman, to bring Motopia to the stage, an idea that has seen many iterations and been in the works for nearly four years.

5
out of 5
37 Ratings

About

The Scene Podcast is a series of little plays brought to you by Janno Media and Get Over It Productions.