Performed at dusk, it’s a uniquely intimate performance which invites you to watch one broken couple explode from their home.
Watch the full film here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dqbE9UshAb8&list=WL&index=44
Extraordinary and surreal
5 out of 5 stars
The Stage - Film
It’s ridiculous, absurd, infuriating and, at points, very, very sad. Which makes it an almost perfect portrayal of an attempt to navigate loss in the aftermath of an utterly unfathomable event. A jumbled-up clown dance through a blank space: that’s grief all right.
4 out of 5 stars
The Stage - Live Performance
Encounter’s hypnotic dance on grief was reinterpreted for digital using one long take. It captured the feeling of staring out of your window in lockdown into snippets of stranger’s lives. Director Jen Malarkey did not simply rework the show for digital – she made the medium integral to it.
Lockdown Hit: Show of 2020, Francesca Peschier
It is an agony to watch, and I mean that as the biggest compliment.
Lyn Gardner, Stage Door
The outdoor nature-concrete setting undeniably provides a sense of journey that a theatre space couldn’t. As the end of the day cocoons around Karen and Keith, people walk home, avoiding the invisible boundaries of grass and pavement under a darkening purple sky. Front doors open and close. The cameras keep the space open and our relationship with the couple ever evolving, even though by the end we know nothing much about them except the aching hole they share. Replaying the experience in my mind the space is imbued with meaning. Next to the tree. In the bush. In between the flats on the paving stones where they dance and talk about prawns and Asda. Place is a poignant trigger for memory.
4 out of 5 stars
Naomi Obeng, Exeunt Magazine
It’s an exaggerated, absurdist space of juxtaposition and dream logic – funny and sad.
4 out of 5 stars
Exeunt Magazine
Orginally co-commissioned by Fuel and The Place
Supported by The Albany, Camden People’s Theatre, Northern Stage and Wandsworth Council. The project is funded by Arts Council England, Wellcome Trust and the Peggy Ramsay Foundation.
Co-created by Jen Malarkey & Lee Mattinson with the company
Associate Director, Temitope Ajose-Cutting
Performers, Carl Harrison & Janet Etuk
Film by Hugo Glendinning
Second Camera, Tilly Shiner
Sound, Gus Collins for House of Noise
Producer, Fuel
The running time for The Kids Are Alright is 55 minutes with no interval.
For adults and young people aged 12+.
Contact jennifer@encounterproductions.org
PRESS
The Stage 2020 >
The Stage, Lockdown Hits: Shows of 2020>
Lyn Gardner, Stage Door>
Exeunt Magazine >
The Wee Review>
iNews >
Interview with Maddy Costa for Exeunt >
Interview with Younger Theatre 2020>
