HOSTING A NIGHT OF NEW THEATRE & PERFORMANCE by Simon Day

Over 2003/04, The Wrong Crowd staged four Pilot nights in a range of non-traditional theatre-spaces in Leamington Spa. Pilot was intended to provide a space where emerging artists could develop new performance through receiving feedback on works-in-progress. Scratch, sketch, platform, cabaret If you're thinking of holding something similar, I hope the following might be useful. I've responded to a few questions that I wish I had asked myself before our first Pilot nights; some, I'm still trying to answer for myself as I look to re-launch the event in spring 2005. Any ideas, reactions and inspiration gratefully received.... Who comes to this venue anyway? Any pub, club, gallery etc. where you might look to hold your night probably already has its own crowd who were there a long time before you were, and may not be your typical audience member. Getting them to walk up the stairs or pop their head round the door could be harder than getting your mates to come along, but could be as important for the success of the event. Are posters worth the paper they're printed on? Designing, printing and distributing conventional publicity can be expensive and time consuming but may not be worth it. Our experience with Pilot showed that the all important word-of-mouth is best spread through a combination of relevant email list postings and the help of a small number of supportive, connected people. Organisations such as Arts and Media Training, for instance, were in contact with many of the sort of artists we wanted to work with, so once they new about Pilot, they would often point people in our direction. The live-art list (sign up at www.jiscmail.ac.uk) certainly seems to do the rounds too, and is worth a look - reaching many people for no cost at all. How can I get all these people to come next time? So, they've all heard about it somehow, they've all come along and enjoyed themselves, then just as you've started to enjoy yourself too, they've scarpered without leaving their contact details so you can tell them all about the next one...Bummer. Filling in forms and answering questionnaires when you're just trying to be entertained These things can be a drag. So how do we get the information we want without boring the punters? I haven't got the answer to that one yet, but I think the question needs working on to help develop communities around events like this. Initiatives such as the Pyramid Project seem to be having an interesting crack at it - check it out at www.sheffieldtheatres.co.uk. What's in it for the artists? Most new practitioners have already made a lot of sacrifices to get to your event. It's not exactly showbiz - little things do go a long way, and their absence is sorely felt. Picking people up from station, introducing them to the other artists, helping them get feedback, documentation etc all help to make it seem worthwhile. It can be as much a community event as a performance for the artists as well as the audience. The organisers of SEEN in Leicester seem committed to this and make a big effort to involve and look after people - find out some more about them at www.seen.org.uk. How can I explain this to my Nan? If you can do this, it probably means you've documented well, which is one of the first things that should get organised but often the first thing to be forgotten along the way. If you're going to continue your night and look to gather interest, raise funding, increase profile as well as advertise and market effectively then anything that can actually show people how well the last one went is going to help you out enormously. This of course applies to the artists themselves showing their new work. Young practitioners don't always have the resources to document their own material effectively, so maybe this can be addressed through the running of your own night. For instance, When Pilot's up and running again, the aim is to provide all featured artists with a set of prints and a video of their own contribution to the night. Hope some of that might trigger a few ideas. Good luck! Simon Day is a freelance theatre-maker and project co-ordinator. Simon was a founding member of The Wrong Crowd, with whom he developed Pilot. He created and runs The B-Theatre - an initiative to support the development of new theatre and performance in the region.