Staging Beckett Conference: Constructing Performance Histories

REGISTRATION NOW OPEN:

http://www.reading.ac.uk/ftt/research/ftt-staging-beckett-conference-april-2014.aspx

April 4-5th 2014, Minghella Building, University of Reading, Whiteknights Campus.

Staging Beckett’s Inaugural conference on 4th – 5th April 2014 will focus on the history, documentation and analysis of Beckett’s theatre in performance in the UK, Ireland and internationally.

Staging Beckett: The Impact of Productions of Samuel Beckett’s Plays in the UK and Ireland is an AHRC-funded project which runs from 2012-2015. It is a collaboration between the Universities of Reading and Chester and the Victoria and Albert Museum, London. The project is compiling a database of all professional productions of Beckett’s plays in the UK and Ireland, with accompanying research resources. The project’s conferences are: Staging Beckett: Constructing Performance Histories (Reading April 4-5, 2014), Staging Beckett in the Regions (Chester, 11-12 September, 2014), and Samuel Beckett and Contemporary Theatre Cultures (Reading, April 2015).

Staging Beckett blog: http://blogs.reading.ac.uk/staging-beckett/

Staging Beckett: Constructing Performance Histories features papers on productions of Beckett from across the globe, including Belgium, Brazil, Hungary, India, Ireland, Mexico, Poland, Turkey, the United States and the UK. Topics will cover Beckett and stage design, Beckett’s theatrical intersections with Pinter and with Shakespeare, staging Beckett in situations of censorship, or crisis and resistance from besieged Sarajevo to the Occupy movement in Zuccotti Park New York, staging Beckett beyond the theatrical frame, and performance histories and perspectives.

Registration fee: £50 per day waged; £30 per day students, seniors and unwaged.

You must register in advance as it will not be possible to register at the conference. 

Keynote Lecture: ‘Beckett and the Non-Place in Irish Performance’, Professor Brian Singleton, Trinity College Dublin, Friday 4th April, 2.30pm

Practitioners’ Panel: ‘Staging Beckett Now’: Saturday 5th April, 3pm.

Natalie Abrahami (Associate Director, Young Vic Theatre, director of Happy Days, starring Juliet Stevenson at the Young Vic, London, Feb-March 2014)

Lisa Dwan (recent performances of Not I / Footfalls / Rockaby at the Royal Court and Duchess Theatre, London, on tour during 2014)

Sarah Jane Scaife (director of site specific performances of Act Without Words II and Rough for Theatre 1 in Dublin (2013), Limerick, London and New York).

More details at:

http://www.reading.ac.uk/ftt/research/ftt-staging-beckett-conference-april-2014.aspx

The Staging Beckett Research Team: Matthew McFrederick (Reading), Anna McMullan (Reading), Patricia McTighe (Reading), David Pattie (Chester), Graham Saunders (Reading), David Tucker (Chester).