Half Hour Hits in Lewes

Spokesman Mark Hewitt promised a day of productions and performances all no longer than 30 minutes duration.

“Many of these are previews of new works in progress, presented for the first time at this event, with multiple showings so there's a few times during the day when you can get to see it. Performances will run throughout the afternoon and early evening.”

Coming up are:

Half Hour Hit #1: Sweeney Agonistes

Performance times: 2pm, 4pm, 7pm

Seven local actors perform Sweeney Agonistes, a surreal and rarely seen work by the great modernist writer, T.S. Eliot (pictured). Written in the mid-1920s, this was a first experiment with verse drama that explored the rhythms of jazz, music hall patter and the colloquial speech of 1920s London. Only two scenes survived Eliot's final edit, Fragment of a Prologue and Fragment of an Agon, published in 1932 as Sweeney Agonistes: Fragments of an Aristophanic Melodrama and first performed in 1933. The work notably provided inspiration for a series of images by painter Francis Bacon. LLL's work-in-progress version shows it has lost none of its power to surprise, amuse or disturb.

Cast

Dusty - Gala Orsborn

Doris - Martina Moss-Clarke

Captain Horsfall / Swarts - Peter Faulkner

Sam Wauchope / Snow - Lucas Augustine

Klipstein - Daniel Cox

Krumpacker - Jeremy Ridley

Sweeney - George Dillon

Half Hour Hit #2: This is always the result

Performance time: 3pm

'This is always the result' is the performance version of a story written by Gus Watcham and narrated live over a film sequence created by Lewes artist Abigail Norris. The work received a 4 star review (Broadway Baby) during Brighton Fringe 2016: “... this is a disturbing exploration into the frailty of the human mind and all its imperfections. If you ever feel like your world is falling down around you, then at least meeting Kathy and Sarah might make you feel better about yourself.” In the story, chaotic violence and human frailty crash in on a woman's ordinary life in a seaside town. The film is shot mainly in Kemp Town and on Brighton seafront. In the performance, the story is spoken into a microphone by one figure (Gus Watcham) silhouetted against a screen. A simple and elegant work exquisitely delivered.

Half Hour Hit #3: Songs of the Chambermaids

Performances times: 6pm, 8pm

Songs of the Chambermaids is a 30 minute section of a new play by LLL's Artistic Director, Mark C. Hewitt. Civilization (and its discontents) - 11 Movements for Theatre. It is a full length work that features around an hour's worth of music by Norwegian sampling percussionist and composer, Thomas Strønen, probably best known in the UK for his work with contemporary jazz ensemble, Food. In this extract, three chambermaids deliver their lines over exhilarating music recorded in Oslo by Strønen's undergraduate drum ensemble at the Norwegian Academy of Music. The words spoken by the chorus of chambermaids follow the narrative arc of Sigmund Freud's essay, Civilization and its Discontents. Because of the rhythmic complexity of the music it is fiendishly difficult to get right. Apocalyptic karaoke for the 21st century.

FUL LIST

2pm: Sweeney Agonistes by T.S. Eliot

3pm: This is always the result by Gus Watcham

4pm: Sweeney Agonistes by T.S. Eliot

6pm: Songs of the Chambermaids by Mark C. Hewitt & Thomas Strønen

7pm: Sweeney Agonistes by T.S. Eliot

8pm: Songs of the Chambermaids by Mark C. Hewitt & Thomas Strønen

Tickets (for each performance): £7.00 advance / £9.00 door.

Tickets for any second or third event can be bought for £5 on the day, so hang on to your original!

Details and tickets online from www.leweslivelit.co.uk / 0797 203 7612