4th Annual Encounter Pilsen I Czech Republic
Three years have passed since the beginning of the Platform 11+ project. The partner theatres have now completed the first two phases of the project.
In the first year they produced and staged ‘national productions’, presenting texts from authors from their own countries. In the second year the emphasis was on ‘bi-national’, country-overlapping works: new plays grew out of a process of co-writing, involving a minimum of two authors. At the end of the co-writing process the plays were staged as co-productions by the co-operating theatres.
Logically, the third and last phase of the project has a European-wide dimension: 24 artists from all of the 12 participating countries join together for a multinational production. As in the two previous phases of the project, new texts were the starting point for the final working process. The authors were requested to write scenes in which the transition from childhood to adulthood would be described: a period of complicated decisions and experiences, a time of farewells and new beginnings.
A pool of work containing more than 20 short texts from European and South American authors arose out of this, each one different in form and content. Not all of the texts were used in the final production, but the wealth of the material was the starting point for an intense analysis of the texts and themes by the young directors. It helped them greatly to get back in touch with a target age group which they had personally long left behind.
The Final Production was born out of a joint three week rehearsal period in which three different groups rehearsed in one place. Four theatres (of the 12 partners) had brought their artists together in one group and during an intense rehearsal period three independent productions were made.
The Czech director, Petr Vodicka, will weave these productions together for a unique Premiere and a series of performances at the Annual Encounter in a school in Pilsen.
Following the performances in the Czech Republic the three separate productions will stage their plays in the four co-operating theatres.
