Rose Company Theatre filmed Jane Lumley's Iphigenia at Aulis in September 2014 and once the editing is completed this will be available for sale. Here is a preview of the interview where Clytemnestra confronts her husband Agamemnon, telling him she knows that he plans to sacrifice their daughter Iphigenia rather than marry her to Achilles, as he had pretended.
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The Rose Company presents a compilation of texts by Shakespeare reflecting on the power of language:
Tickets: http://online-payments.lancaster-university.co.uk/browse/product.asp?compid=1&modid=1&catid=436
]]>Well, it's just under 2 weeks to opening night, and so, like any good director, I am not so much thinking at this stage as existing in a state of blind panic! There is so much to do and, as always, the mountain to climb seems daunting. This show is one of the most logistically complicated I have ever undertaken - 16 female performers, playing 59 male and female roles (not to mention the non-speaking roles) in eleven main scenes taken from a range of Shakespeare's plays Still, I am regularly ticking things off my "to do" list and, together with my talented cast, we are certainly making the right kind of progress.
I am really enjoying watching the production gently mature in rehearsal, getting ready for an audience. Highlights from the rehearsal room this week have been: adding a basic pavane to an argument between Beatrice and Benedict from Much Ado; finding the relationship between Kent and Lear that allows Kent to speak so bluntly and passionately to Lear; and deciding on a cheeky costume addition, which makes the most of the cross-dressing of Julia from Two Gentlemen of Verona.
I can't wait to get into our actual venue to rehearse - we get in next weekend. We're performing in A-wing at Lancaster Castle - part of the ex-prison - and an area of the castle not normally open to the public - an extra treat, then, for our audiences! It's a 3 storey space with cells on both sides (one of them reputed to be haunted!) and, as a major focus of our show is the importance of speech, I am looking forward to getting some voices to come from surprising places.
Tickets are available from the link below. The show is March 14th and 15th at 8pm. Hope to see you there! (And watch this space for some thoughts from various cast members over the next few days and some rehearsal images.)
http://online-payments.lancaster-university.co.uk/browse/product.asp?compid=1&modid=1&catid=436
Emma Rucastle
@elaru
We've just celebrated our first birthday, and the past year has been great fun. During the past 12 months we've performed in theatres, universities and a castle (one with turrets, dungeons and a portcullis!). We've met some fantastic people, made plenty of new friends, featured on BBC Radio Lancashire and BBC Radio 4 Woman's Hour, and had the honour of being one of Diva magazine's 'Top 10 Lez/Bi Things to Do This Week'. We were thrilled by the wonderful response we've received for 'Iphigenia'- and now we've started working on our second project ...
The Rose Company's production of Lady Jane Lumley's 'Iphigenia' was first performed as a work in progress at The Minghella Theatre, Reading University, 9 July 2013. The show was directed by Emma Rucastle. The cast was as follows:
Agamemnon Ruth Gregson
Senex/ Nuntio Alison Findlay
Clytemnestra/Menelaus Aliki Chapple
Iphigenia Madie Howard
Achilles Elle Lund
Chorus/ Lumley Emma Rucastle
Agamemnon Ruth GregsonSenex Alison Findlay
Menelaus Helen Katamba
Clytemnestra Aliki Chapple
Iphigenia Catherine Bateman
Achilles Elle Lund
Nuntio 1 Marian Cox
Nuntio 2 Christine Burn
Chorus Christine Burn
The music used in the production, the Seikilos Epitaph, is the oldest known pieces of musical composition as we know it. Our version, performed live by the cast, has lyrics translated from the original Greek by Aliki Chapple:Marian Cox
Beth Cortese
Director Emma RucastleEleanor Barton-Mather
Dramaturg Alison FindlayProducer Ruth Gregson
Vocal Coach Marion Middleditch
Props and Costume Aliki Chapple
Graphic Design Harold Saxon
We're so pleased with the response to Jane Lumley's Iphigenia, we'll be touring again in 2014.
You can still hear some performance extracts and Alison and Emma talking about the play on Woman's Hour, right at the end of the programme.
http://www.kingsarmssalford.com/index.php?id=9
Phone: 01772 499 425
http://www.newcontinental.net/whats-on/event/iphigenia
We had a fantastic time on our mini-Iphigenia tour - Lancaster Castle, November 19-21; Homerton College, Cambridge, November 23; UCL, London, November 24. Thanks to all who came to see us and/or who supported us in any way. We are looking forward to our next set of dates in January: King's Arms,Salford, Sunday January 12th; The Continental Theatre, Preston Thursday January 16th, Lancaster Castle (we're back there by popular demand!) Friday January 17th; The Lantern Theatre, Liverpool, Sunday January 18th.
Here are some photos from the dates so far performed:
We really hope to see you at our January shows. Do get in touch with us via email if you have any questions/comments - rosecompanytheatre@gmail.com.A link to the King's Arms, Salford, where tickets can be reserved for January 12th can be found by by following this link: Reserve tickets here. Full details of how to reserve tickets for other venues will appear very soon.
]]>You can't have a Greek tragedy - not even an Early Modern one - without a Chorus, and ours is something special. (Rehearsal photo by Emma Rucastle)
Director Emma Rucastle and Professor Alison Findlay (who edited the performance script and plays Senex) were interviewed on Woman's Hour on 29th November. You can hear the interview (36 minutes into the programme) by following this link )
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03jfk1v
Flyer for The Rose Company by Harry Saxon. http://about.me/harryasaphsaxon
The Tragedie of Euripedes called Iphigeneia dramatizes how Iphigenia is brought to Aulis to be sacrificed so that the Greek ships can sail to Troy. It was first ‘translated out of Greake into Englisshe’ c.1555 by Lady Jane Lumley, and has only been performed twice in modern times. It is the first known dramatic text by a woman in English. Lumley’s script shows how Iphigenia is physically, politically and emotionally imprisoned: caught between the demands of her father Agamemnon (the Greek commander) and her mother Clytemnestra who strives to save her daughter’s life through marriage to the hero Achilles. This production will emphasize the limits of female agency and the possibilities to transcend them offered by Lumley’s script, and by all-female productions.
Lady Jane Lumley’s
sixteenth-century translation of Euripedes’ tragedy, the first to appear in
English, engages directly with issues of imprisonment, freedom of choice and
gendered identity. Her tragic heroine transcends the stalemate of her parents’
quarrel by declaring
"I will offer my selfe willing to deathe, for my countrie"
Iphigenia’s courage and resolution contrasts with Agamemnon’s cowardice, indecision and deceit. Fearing the Greek army (the ‘host’), his wife’s reaction, and his own inability to carry out the sacrifice of his daughter, Agamemnon pretends that he has summoned Iphigenia to be married to Achilles. Lumley suggests that in both cases, the reduction of a woman to a ‘commoditie’ to be trafficked between men is wrong.
Iphigenia’s story had immediate relevance for the translator, Lady Jane Lumley, since her father, Lord Arundel, had sacrificed her cousin, Lady Jane Grey to be executed at the hands of Catholic Mary Tudor. Lady Jane Grey was proclaimed Queen of England on 9th October 1553 but ruled for only nine days before she was imprisoned in the Tower of London and executed on 12 February 1554. Euripedes’ tragedy is an ideal vehicle to express the sense of guilt, loss, blame and anger which must have hung over the Lumley household.
Lumley’s translation is daring in finding moments of dark comedy in the ludicrous situations faced by the protagonists. It also speaks out against a tradition of male, military valour, since Lumley’s Greek hero is Iphigenia.
The Rose Company was established in 2013 out of the love of classic and historical performance texts and a belief in gender justice. This first production represents their commitment to bringing historical texts to contemporary life. http://therosecompany.posthaven.com/
WOMEN OF LANCASTER, WE
WANT YOU!
October 1st, 7:30 PM The Lord Ashton
The Rose Company : Iphigenia and more
We are an all-female classical theatre company based in Lancaster, performing neglected gems by women writers as well as plays by Shakespeare and other canonical texts.
We are now developing our production of Jane Lumley’s Iphigenia for performance in Lancaster and on tour in November 2013 and we are looking for women actors to take part.
If you are interested in this or future projects do come along and/or get in touch. You will find us on Facebook, Twitter (@TheRoseCompany), and rosecompanytheatre@gmail.com
The Rose Company is a newly formed Lancaster-based all-female theatre company We specialise in bringing historical texts to contemporary life.
To that end, our first production will be Lady Jane Lumley's adaptation of Euripides' Iphigenia At Aulis, which is the first translation of Euripides into English and the first known dramatic work by a woman in English. It is a dynamic, surprisingly modern-feeling translation of the Greek and will be a challenging and fun text to work with and perform.
The date for this performance is the evening of Tuesday July 9th and the venue is the Minghella Theatre at Reading University; the performance is part of an academic conference being held at Reading that week.
Rehearsals, provisionally, will take place in Lancaster (venue to be confirmed) on the weekends of June 22nd/23rd and 29th/30th, as well as the evenings of the week before the show - July 1st to 6th. We intend to travel to Reading early on the 9th (by train - unless performers wish to drive) and return the following day, hopefully staying in university accommodation overnight - keeping everything as cheap and manageable as possible.
We would then like to revive the show in the autumn and perform in the north-west. Future productions will follow...
We are holding a reading/casting for the show on Monday 20th May at 7pm, upstairs in The Borough, Lancaster - and we would love to see you there! Please RSVP to rosecompanytheatre@gmail.com letting us know your availability/interest. Additionally, do consider coming along to the meeting, even if you are unavailable for this first show. The Iphigenia needs a cast of 8; future productions are likely to be larger, so it would be great to start a network of women performers and creatives of all kinds. If you are not Lancaster-based, but would like to be included in future communications, again, please let us know.
Best wishes,
Emma Rucastle (director)
on behalf of The Rose Company (founder members Aliki Chapple, Alison Findlay, Ruth Gregson, and Emma Rucastle).
Email: rosecompanytheatre@gmail.com
Twitter: @The RoseCompany
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