Cloud Nine Theatre Company
Cloud Nine Theatre Company was established in 1997 by the North-Eastern playwright Peter Mortimer. The Company's aim is to produce only new theatre, commissioned only from Northern writers and to take live theatre to places other theatre companies would not contemplate.
The Company achieved that aim in 2004 when it walked a play called Off the Wall the entire length of Hadrian's Wall giving 11 performances along an 84 mile stretch of the wall in various unusual venues in small remote communities. Cloud Nine has now produced the work of 30 different playwrights.
New writing is central to Cloud Nine's work, and we are always keen to become involved in new initiatives. The Company runs a regular series of PlayDays, which workshop and perform extracts of new writers' work. If you are interested - either as an author or as audience! - why not come along to our next PlayDay, on February 7th, when two new half-hour Northern plays will be put on their feet before a live audience in Bishop Auckland Town Hall as the culmination of our latest PlayDays project. To reserve seats for February 7th at 7.30 pm, telephone: 01388 602 610; and for more details see our Calendar page.
Other writers interested in submitting short - 30 minute - scripts should contact our artistic director, Peter Mortimer, on cloudninetheatre@blueyonder.co.uk who would also be pleased to have your comments and ideas.
Don't Miss This Bus!
Margaret Scragg, long-standing member of Cloud Nine's Sixties Group, reveals details about their next project, Strangers on a Bus, which hits the boards in North Tyneside early in 2010.
There's just no stopping Cloud Nine's Sixties Group riding on the success of their latest play, Bingo! This time the group have joined forces with playwright Neil Armstrong.
As usual, ideas for this new play, Strangers on a Bus, evolved from a bunch of senior citizens sitting around a table sharing their ideas with the writer on what would be a good theme for the play.
We agreed the play should grip our audience in the first few minutes and have a set of interesting and complex characters that we wanted to travel on our bus: the driver (a surly man of a few words), a troubled woman who appears to be heavily pregnant, a rather sleepy Vicar, and one very posh, excitable woman who, in a senior moment, decided to take a bus ride. There's a man of mystery, a local tribute singer and - what do you know - an unemployed fortune teller.
Come along; and fasten your seatbelts, you're in for rocky ride. The making of the play has been a great journey and we invite you and your friends and neighbours to take this trip with us, and these 'strangers'.
Strangers on a Bus will now premiere in April: see our Calendar of Events for schedule of performances.
For more Cloud Nine news, our latest newsletter (and and archive of past issues) is available to download from our News page.
Website revised and maintained by Cornwell Internet
Last update: 3rd February 2010