Boil and Bubble is a recently formed, Bristol based theatre company. Our aim is to provide entertaining and thought-provoking theatre for a wide-ranging audience, while giving opportunities to older writers, actors, directors, designers and technicians, especially women.
With the generous support of Awards for All we launched our successful first production early in 2007 - a double-bill of linked plays: The Witching Hour and Strawberry Time, written specially by Pameli Benham, chair of Boil and Bubble, for three talented and experienced actors, two older and one younger. (Please see Feedback/Reviews.)
Although we concentrate on exploring the riches that older people with a wealth of experience bring to theatre performance, we have no intention of being a geriatric ghetto, so we shall sometimes work with a mixture of ages. We also want to demonstrate - contrary to popular stereotypes - how wide, colourful and fascinating the lives, interests, experiences and abilities of most older people are.
Since our successful double-bill debut in Bristol and Bath in early 2007, Boil and Bubble have concentrated on bringing live theatre to older people in Day Centres. In collaboration with Kokopelli Theatre we have encouraged older people to tell us their stories and instantly acted them back, to the audience's amazement and pleasure.
We have been told a wonderful variety of experiences, from a feisty widow of 75 passing her driving test first time (thanks to her "drop dead gorgeous" instructor), to memories of childhood wildness and mischief: capsizing rafts, exploding fireworks, playing practical jokes. We celebrated a 98th birthday, heard what it was like to get up for work at 4.00 a.m. as a 14 year old housemaid in a mansion with 40 servants, and what it felt like to be part of the Normandy landings.
These pictures show some of our audiences' reactions to seeing their stories come alive as the actors instantly played them back with wit and imagination.
Please see What's forthcoming? for information about future workshops.