Mathew Bourne & New Adventures Celebrate 25th Anniversary

Matthew Bourne and New Adventures are delighted to announce a year long celebration of work and special events to commemorate the 25th Anniversary of the company's first performance in 1987. New Adventures (formerly Adventures in Motion Pictures) gave it's first performances in the late eighties under the direction of Bourne, Emma Gladstone and David Massingham. In 1991 Bourne became the sole Artistic Director and guided the company from a small scale touring troupe to a worldwide dance phenomenon, making Bourne himself a star choreographer with an international reputation. The name change to New Adventures in 2002 brought further success, guided by co-director, Robert Noble, and a new repertoire of popular premieres, major revivals and extraordinary audience development.

Throughout their anniversary year, New Adventures will play over 300 performances at a record 32 UK venues, several of them more than once. This will include 20 weeks (over the 4 productions) at the company's resident home Sadler's Wells. The productions will feature over 80 dancers and 30 musicians.

Matthew Bourne said today "When a group of friends and graduates from the Laban Centre decided to create a new dance company together in 1987, none of them would have dared to dream what lay ahead. From those unpaid early days of small scale touring in a minibus, equipped with a dance floor, an iron and a dodgy sound system, grew a company that eventually conquered the West End, Broadway and turned a whole new audience of theatre goers into dance lovers. Of this, I am both grateful and incredibly proud. After 25 years, it really does seem like something worth celebrating!"

Matthew Bourne's NUTCRACKER!

Touring throughout the UK in November 2011 and then between January - May 2012
Sadler's Wells - 6 December 2011 - 22 January 2012 (Press Night 14 December 2011)

The 25th Anniversary celebrations start with Matthew Bourne's NUTCRACKER! Touring to 20 UK venues (making this tour the company's largest ever to date), this seasonal favourite from the New Adventures repertoire will also mark the company's 10th consecutive festive season at Sadler's Wells, where it will play for seven weeks.

EARLY ADVENTURES
Spitfire, Town and Country and The Infernal Galop
TICKETS ON SALE FOR Sadler's Wells - 14 NOVEMBER 2011

Bath Theatre Royal 9 - 12 May 2012, Poole Lighthouse 15 & 16 May 2012, Brighton Corn Exchange 17 - 19 May 2012, Sadler's Wells 21 - 26 May 2012 (Press Night 22 May 2012), Northampton Royal 28 - 30 May 2012, Richmond Theatre 31 May - 2 June 2012, Cardiff Sherman Theatre 5 & 6 June 2012, Truro Hall for Cornwall 8 & 9 June, Oxford Playhouse 11 - 13 June 2012, Cambridge Arts Theatre 14 - 16 June, Warwick Arts Centre 18 - 20 June 2012, Bromley Churchill Theatre 21 - 23 June 2012 and Nottingham Playhouse 25 June 2012.

EARLY ADVENTURES is a triple bill of the works that launched Bourne's career and cemented New Adventures reputation for wit, style and sheer entertainment. It also sees the company return to some of the small and mid-scale venues that championed the company in its early years.

Spitfire was Bourne's first hit in 1988. Both a celebration of masculine vanity and an affectionate comment on the preening grandeur of the classical male dancer, it hilariously places the most famous 19th Century ballet showstopper in the world of men's underwear advertising and mail order catalogue photography.

Town and Country - Remembered as the piece that most crystallized the Bourne style; gloriously witty and ironic but also strangely moving and heartfelt. It explores notions of national character from a bygone era through the evocative music of Edward Elgar, Noel Coward and Percy Grainger, amongst others. This 1991 two part dance revue features a high speed version of the classic film, Brief Encounter, a furtive encounter between two repressed gents, a jolly clog dance with a violent conclusion, a daringly wild ride on children's scooters and an eccentric version of Pomp and Circumstance plated on the ukelele!

The Infernal Galop - A breakthrough hit in 1989, this "Franglais Spectacular" was inspired by icons of France in the 1930s and 1940s; Edith Piaf, Charles Trenet, Tino Rossi, Jacques Tati etc. Through a series of surprising and saucy vignettes this is France as seen by the uptight English imagination with all the traditional clichés joyously paraded for our entertainment and climaxing in Offenbach's inevitable Can-Can!

Matthew Bourne's PLAY WITHOUT WORDS

Devised by Matthew Bourne, music by Terry Davies
inspired by Joseph Losey's film by special arrangement with StudioCanal,
based on ‘The Servant' by Robin Maugham.
TICKETS ON SALE FOR Sadler's Wells - 14 NOVEMBER 2011

Leicester Curve 29 June - 7 July 2012, Sadler's Wells 12 July - 15 August 2012 (Press Night 18 July 2012), Norwich Theatre Royal 7 - 11 August 2012

Chelsea, 1965. Behind the privileged façade of domestic social order lies a struggle for power, territory and sexual domination. In a suave Chelsea home an urbane master and his beautiful fiancee welcome their new manservant, Prentice. What follows will change their lives forever -
Returning for it's first revival, PLAY WITHOUT WORDS was a critical and popular success, when it premiered as part of The National Theatre's experimental TRANSFORMATIONS season in 2002. Designer Lez Brotherston and Lighting Designer Paule Constable repeat their Olivier nominated work, with choreography by Matthew Bourne and the Original Company. Terry Davies' acclaimed Jazz influenced score will be played live at all performances.

PLAY WITHOUT WORDS was the first production presented by New Adventures (after the name change from Adventures In Motion Pictures) and won the 2003 Olivier Awards for Best Entertainment and Best Theatre Choreographer.

World Premiere
Matthew Bourne's SLEEPING BEAUTY
a gothic fairy tale

Music by Tchaikovsky
New Scenario by Matthew Bourne after Perrault and Petipa
CHRISTMAS 2012
ON SALE DATE TO BE ANNOUNCED

New Adventures' year of celebration culminates with the World Premiere of Matthew Bourne's latest re-imagining of an iconic and beloved ballet classic. Matthew Bourne's SLEEPING BEAUTY sees the choreographer return to the music of Tchaikovsky to complete the trio of the composer's ballet masterworks that started in 1992 with Nutcracker! and, most famously, in 1995, with the international hit Swan Lake.

Perrault's timeless fairy tale, about a young girl cursed to sleep for one hundred years, was turned into a legendary ballet by Tchaikovsky and choreographer, Marius Petipa, in 1890. Bourne takes this date as his starting point, setting the Christening of Aurora, the story's heroine, in the year of the ballets first performance; the height of the Fin-de-Siecle period when fairies, vampires and decadent opulence fed the gothic imagination. As Aurora grows into a young woman, we move forwards in time to the more rigid, uptight Edwardian era; a mythicAl Golden age of long Summer afternoons, croquet on the lawn and new dance crazes. Years later, awakening from her century long slumber, Aurora finds herself in the modern day; a world more mysterious and wonderful than any Fairy story!

Matthew Bourne's haunting new scenario is a gothic tale for all ages; the traditional tale of good vs. evil and rebirth is turned upside-down, creating a supernatural love story, across the decades, that even the passage of time itself cannot hinder.

Britain's most popular dance showman works again with three of his regular collaborators, and New Adventures Associate Artists; The Tony and Olivier award winning designers, Lez Brotherston (Set and Costumes) and Paule Constable (Lighting) and Sound Designer, Paul Groothuis who created the acclaimed surround-sound for last years hit production of Cinderella.

In addition to the productions above, there will also be many other events to celebrate the milestone of 25 years. Several are detailed below. Further events to be announced soon.

Matthew Bourne AND HIS NEW ADVENTURES
Published by Faber 17 November 2011

This is a new revised edition of the book first published by Faber in 2000. Featuring the New York Times Dance Critic, Alastair Macaulay's interviews with Bourne about his work with Adventures in Motion Pictures, New Adventures and in Musical Theatre, the new edition covers everything in the last decade (since the formation of New Adventures) and features new chapters on The Car Man, Play Without Words, Edward Scissorhands and Dorian Gray as well as major revivals and Matthew's work on the Olivier award winning musicals My Fair Lady and Mary Poppins.

There will be a PLATFORM on MONDAY 21 NOVEMBER AT 6.00PM at The National Theatre's LYTTELTON THEATRE with Matthew Bourne in conversation with Variety critic David Benedict, followed by a book signing.

HONORARY COMPANION TRINITY LABAN

On 9 December 2011 Matthew will be awarded the title of Honorary Companion of his old college, Trinity Laban Conservatoire (formerly The Laban Centre). It was at the Laban Centre 25 years ago, on 15 July 1987, that Adventures in Motion Pictures gave its first performance.

CHANNEL 4 - Matthew Bourne CHRISTMAS SPECIAL (w/t)

This Christmas, to celebrate the world and work of Matthew Bourne, Channel 4 has commissioned a new dance film that will showcase Bourne's signature abilities to emotionally engage an audience. This hour long special will feature familiar characters from many of Bourne's best known works, but all reinvented for the camera in studio and filmed in 360 degrees. Matthew Bourne Christmas Special (w/t) is a journey through a series of magical worlds, where stories are told through dance, and promises to delight both Bourne's fans and new audiences alike. Channel 4 and More4 are showcasing a number of dance films over Christmas, including another chance to see Matthew Bourne's Nutcracker!

SKY ARTS

New Adventures continue their ongoing relationship with Sky Arts. The recently filmed Swan Lake in 3D, with the 2010 cast, will be one of the main Christmas highlights for Sky Arts, transmitting on 22 December at 8.00pm on Sky Arts 2 and on Sky 3D.

NEW ADVENTURES CHOREOGRAPHER AWARD - SHOWCASE PERFORMANCE
AUTUMN 2012

The showcase performance of the New Adventures Choreographer Award winner James Cousins and runner-up Tom Jackson Greaves will feature choreography created with the help of both Matthew Bourne and the New Adventures team.

RE:BOURNE - SUMMER ADVENTURE

30 July - 3 August 2012

RE:BOURNE, the education wing of New Adventures, launches a Summer School with a difference. Each year will be differently themed and varied in structure. SUMMER ADVENTURE will be by invitation only and will be mostly made up from those dancers who New Adventures Associates have singled out at our annual auditions for further consideration. Next years project will, as part of the 25th Anniversary, concentrate on the repertoire of New Adventures and the Matthew Bourne style of narrative driven choreography and will feature the reconstruction of a never before seen Bourne piece, WATCH WITH MOTHER, made in 1991, but never performed publicly.

 

Photo Credit: Kevin Thomas Garcia