This workshop is a festival of emotions, where performers who have been trained in the Art of Acting have the opportunity to play big feelings to the fullest.

Melodrama is an art that belongs to another age, a bygone time when everyone knew the difference between Right and Wrong. Moral certainties order the world of melodrama, as audiences—honest people hungry for Justice—watch a battle play out between Good and Evil. These old-fashioned ways of expressing yourself are all in melodrama, which had its heyday in the 19th century and produced masterpieces by the likes of Charles Dickens, Victor Hugo, Benito Perez Galdos, Dion Boucicault, and more.

During that time, actors in melodrama embraced techniques to express emotions, using their bodies and their spirits to their fullest potential: brilliant gestures, wonderful fixed points, and loud and strong voices full of impressive and fun noises.

This workshop explores how you can play this “game of emotions” in your own work today. Playing emotions as a game—as opposed to attempting psychological realism—gives you the freedom to go to extremes, to have enormous fun playing emotions that performers would not normally think of as fun, such as grief, hate, jealousy, and rage. Playing this game to the full has been at the heart of Spymonkey’s work. We love to laugh and now we will love to cry.

ABOUT AITOR BASAURI

Aitor Basauri is the founder of Spymonkey, where he has co-created and performed in all their shows to date. Performance credits include The Servant of Two Masters at Sheffield Crucible (1996), Axomate at the Seville Expo (1992), Eulenspiegel (1991) and in Karl’s Kuhne Gassenchau’s Grand Paradis and Stau in Zurich (1997 and 1998). Director of Little Prince for Donkey Productions (1997), Un Vento Impetuoso for La Canoppia (1996) and Meci Y Me Fui for Pez Enraya ( 1997). In 1999 he appeared in Circus Knie, the Swiss State Circus, and in 2000 formed his own company Punto Fijo, based in Bilbao. Appeared in Cirque Images’ 2003 series Solstrom for Bravo Cable Network. Appeared in Bertolt Brecht’s Senor Carrera’s Rifles at the Young Vic, directed by Paul Hunter (2007).

Directing credits include: Lily & Marlene for La Dinamica (Spain 2015); Looking for Duende for Teatro Entre Escombros (Spain 2015); Hondycops for Squadra Sua (Czech Republic 2015); Ferucchio Peru is Extraordinaire for Leebo Luby (UK 2015); Manifest Destiny (New York 2015); Fabulous Bäckström Brothers (Finland 2014); Entre Escobros 600 Teatro (Spain 2014); Gloriator for Skipstick Productions (London 2013); NMIID Simone Riccio, (London 2013); Herr Ist Immer Der Natur for Die Drei Auf Den Baum (Berlin 2012); Discombobulated for Publick Transport (Bristol & UK tour, 2011); Ramshackadelicious (Bristol 2011); Shake for The Last Baguette (Switzerland 2010). Director of physical comedy for Chichester Festival Theatre’s Mack & Mabel (2015) starring Michael Ball. Co-director of Orpheus in the Underworld at Vienna Volksoper operahouse (2023).

Aitor is an acclaimed teacher of clown, regularly leading Spymonkey training in London, New York, Maine, Los Angeles, and around the world, and for the Clown Doctors organization in Germany, Austria, and France.

ABOUT SPYMONKEY

Spymonkey are the United Kingdom’s leading physical comedy ensemble, based in Brighton and comprising of a core team: artistic directors Toby Park and Aitor Basauri, executive producer Emily Coleman, founding associate Petra Massey, associate artists Lucy Bradridge and Carl Grose, founding associate Petra Massey, and general manager Nur Khairiyah Ramli.

Spymonkey have been making Theatre of the Funny since 1998. With their dark, edgy physical comedy rooted “somewhere between Monty Python, the Marx Brothers, and Samuel Beckett” (The Houston Chronicle), Spymonkey have proved to be a truly international phenomenon, enjoyed by and accessible to a wide range of international audiences.

Recent years have seen the company growing in new directions as their creative focus has shifted from primarily a performing ensemble to creating, directing, and producing, as well as an extensive international training programme. They recently directed Orpheus in the Underworld, their first full-scale opera, and Spymonkey’s first show for children, Hairy.

Stephan Kreiss was an associate artist until his death in 2021.

Contact the host of Melodrama with Aitor Basauri

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