Eleanor Turney
Managing Editor

Making a four-hour round trip to Stratford-on-Avon might not be the most sensible way to spend a Wednesday, but when the RSC’s A Tender Thing is at the other end, it’s more than worth the trip. Interviewing Edward Bond was a personal highlight, although he remains my most terrifying interviewee to date… Organising the Edinburgh Critics Team with Jake and C venues was wonderful – I’m delighted we were able to offer eight young people the chance to go to the Fringe and to get so much out of their time there. The Chekhov revivals across London (especially Uncle Vanya at the Print Room and The Seagull at Southwark Playhouse) have made me a very happy bunny, and in a year of Shakespeare, Theatre Delicatessen’s Henry V  and Filter Theatre’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream at the Lyric are my standout shows. I’ve rounded off the year seeing two wonderful Christmas shows: NIE’s Hansel and Gretel at the Tobacco Factory and Bristol Old Vic’s wonderful Peter Pan.

Laura Turner
Features Editor

2012 has been a busy and really exciting time for the Features sections. We’ve chatted to Michael Grandage, Philip Ridley, Kate Tempest, Steven Berkoff and Jack Thorne to mention just a few. We had our biggest and best yet coverage of the Edinburgh Fringe and over the year our growing team of writers have profiled the work of Simon Stephens, The Paper Birds, English Touring Opera, Northern Broadsides, Edward Bond, the RSC and the Old Vic New Voices – and that’s just the tip of the ice berg as we went behind the scenes at theatres across the country and had exclusive content from the National Theatre Connections Directors’ Weekend.

As Features Editor, there have been so many highlights over the year and it’s been a privilege to work with the AYT team and all the dedicated features writers who invest so much time and energy into the pieces they write, whether they’re interviewing DC Moore, getting the exclusive info on London’s newest theatre or blogging about their experiences of the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. On a personal note, I’ve loved some of the recent features I’ve worked on from TheatreCraft to Talawa Theatre Company’s new take on King Lear earlier this winter. In terms of stand out performances, Love Love Love at the Court was pretty unforgettable, as were Sixty Four Miles and Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde at Hull Truck. I’ve still not seen Matilda – number one aim for 2013!

Becky Brewis
Commissioning Editor:

My AYT year was gently ushered in with a few words from Coney practitioners, scrawled on a scrap of paper: “undertaker”. This was one of the theatre company’s famous “days of play”, held at Battersea Arts Centre, where a group of us became immersed in the life of a small town, taking on roles and spreading gossip.  It was a chance to meet people, to interact in new ways and to experiment. Things got raucous but I didn’t have to take out any dead bodies.

For another AYT feature earlier this year I met Fiona Lindsay, the Creative Producer of Digital Theatre Plus to hear about how this brilliant online theatre tool is putting great British theatre on a global stage, by making artistic, high-quality films of stage shows. I got to watch Frantic Assembly’s Lovesong in my own bed. It might not be able to bring it to your bedroom, but Shakespeare’s Globe is similarly keen to extend its reach, as I discovered when I spoke to the Education department’s Jamie Arden about Merry Meetings, the programme that brought seventeenth-century drama to Latitude Festival. They had to fight off the groupies.

Another annual festivity – for those involved at least – is the Old Vic New Voices, 24 Hour Plays, and it was a real pleasure to talk to some past writers, actors, producers and directors about the legacy of the project. I heard how being part of what director Steve Winter describes as the “OVNV family” has shaped them: “I always refer back to the 24 Hour Plays as being the project that made me realise anything was possible,” said Sophie Watson, one of last year’s participants.

And as the year draws to a close it’s looking like anything is possible for AYT too. It was a pleasure to represent AYT at last month’s TheatreCraft conference at the Royal Opera House, where we met so many budding theatre writers. But the main personal highlight for me this year was sub-editing the truly excellent work of the AYT reviewers up in Edinburgh over the summer. At my computer in South London I could practically smell the rancid beer mats, and it was a real treat to have the festival brought to life by such a talented team.

Ryan Ford Iosco
Reviews Co-Ordinator

The reviews section of AYT has grown quite a bit over the last year. Our reviewers now attend shows regularly at venues such as the National Theatre, the Royal Court Theatre and the Almeida Theatre as well as promoting new/young companies that are just emerging. 2012 saw AYT review our first film, Tom Hooper’s Les Miserables (which will be out on 11 January 2013), as well as attend the Edinburgh Fringe Festival with a team of reviewers who covered an unimaginable amount of shows. AYT’s reviewers have been all over the UK and have covered many different aspects of the theatre world this year. As 2012 closes we are preparing for a 2013 that already looks busier and more exciting.

Catherine Noonan
Blogs Editor

What have been the best AYT moments of 2012? Well, from a personal point of view, the articles I enjoyed writing the most tend to hail from the beginning of the year: interviewing Louise Rennison, who was both wonderfully mad and incredibly interesting; finding out more about female-led theatre with Shared Experience’s Polly Teale; writing about crowdfunded theatre and subsequently getting my first article published on the Guardian website. There have been many wonderful moments working with AYT’s bloggers: the great content that our regular contributors turn out week after week; connecting with theatre lovers from across the Atlantic; publishing brilliant guest blogs (such as this one and this one). And, finally, I couldn’t round up the year without mentioning how rewarding it is be part of a site that has produced outstanding Edinburgh coverage and collaborated with some wonderful organisations (the Royal Opera House! The Guardian! C venues! TheatreCraft!) So, a big thank you to all of AYT’s editors, writers and readers of 2012. It’s been a pleasure.

Jake Orr
Founder and Artistic Director

Reading through the AYT Editors 2012 Highlights above, I am left immensely proud. When I founded A Younger Theatre in 2009 I had no idea that some three years later we’d be partnering with the Royal Opera House, unleashing a team of critics at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival or that we’d pass 8,500 followers on Twitter. AYT is built and maintained by a wonderful team of young people who pour their time, hearts and energy into making it a success. So firstly, a big thank you to all our writers and Editorial Team.

2012 was a curious year for theatre. We saw an influx of German practitioners shaking up British theatre with the likes of Thomas Ostermeier’s Hamlet, Sebastian Nubling’s direction of Simon Stephens’s Three Kingdoms and Cate Blanchett in Gross und Klein. LIFT Festival threw up some challenging pieces including Back To Back’s Ganesh vs the Third Reich, and an epic eight-hour performance of Gatz by Elevator Repair Service. In children’s theatre I was transfixed by Little Angel Theatre’s The Tear Thief and Mark Arends’s Something Very Far Away at the Unicorn Theatre. Whilst in Edinburgh I was left weeping at And No More Shall We Part at the Traverse Theatre, and positively bursting with energy at Charlotte Josephine’s Bitch Boxer. Let’s not forget the flop that is Viva Forever! which made me question why we even make theatre, terrible, terrible theatre.

In my blogging I found myself questioning how I respond to theatre in an apology to Melanie Wilson, and later considering how theatre and emotion are entwined after the death of a family member. Then there are the numerous events AYT hosted with our readers, including a digital takeover of the Royal Opera House, live blogging The Junction’s Sampled Festival, and two trips to the Old Vic Theatre. We were media partners with C venues at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival and also for TheatreCraft at the Royal Opera House.

Our writers have contributed 905 posts to A Younger Theatre, generating nearly a million pageviews. All of this delivered by volunteers under the age of 26, and showing that young people have a passion for theatre just as much as everyone else. Bring on 2013.

Article image by Jen Collins.

Virginia Woolf asserted that to have a room of one’s own was a necessity in order to write; not only a room with a window and four walls, but space to think, imagine and create. As Artistic Director of a theatre company in the very early stages of its creative growth, I am realising how challenging this can be. The search for a space to play, develop and grow seems to play a formative role in the early life of a theatre company. But is this hunt beginning to stunt creative growth?

Trying to find rehearsal space has been a constant problem for Witness Theatre, a worry that we could do without as we attempt to find our own theatrical identity. In rehearsal for The Importance of Being Earnest at Brighton Fringe this year, I was lucky enough to be given some free rehearsal space by the organisation Somewhereto_. Set up as part of the cultural Olympiad to help young people find space to do the things they love, the lifespan of this organisation is limited, but it’s an inspirational model.  Despite being a basic, ugly, council-owned building that always smelt strangely of yeast, the space we were gifted was lovely. It was a glimpse into an ideal world, a brick-walled warren of space where we could clear the floors and cover the walls with research and development material. This was invaluable for a theatre company that works as we do, allowing ideas to bounce around before being pinned down. But the financial ramifications of excessive use of space are huge, and finding somewhere to play isn’t easy.

Theatre companies and individual theatre makers need a home, but only those with proven experience and expertise seem to be able to find them. Most of us have a place we call home, but combining living space and work space can be difficult. If you’ve ever tried to rehearse in someone’s house you’ll know it normally ends disastrously and if you work freelance you’ll know how maddening it can be spending all day chasing an idea around four walls and a sofa. But for the financially struggling, what (other than choosing a more lucrative career path) are the other options?

One way young theatre makers can find space is in a digital capacity – BAC’s new digital scratch programme, for example. The value of digital space is huge, but its availability doesn’t importance of physical space and real people. Currently it seems having such space is a measure of success, afforded only to very large companies or those dubbed as emerging new talent. This is fair enough, credit and rewards for hard work where they’re due. But, similar to Lyn Gardner’s recent argument in the The Guardian for more grassroots funding, I’d argue for more offers of space at a grassroots level. Unlike funding, there is a lot of space out there not being used – what we need are the people taking a leap of faith and letting young companies make the most of it. I know it’s idealistic to ask for all this space to be given for free, but as a member of a young company who have benefited from this, I know how vital it is.

Recently there’s been a rise in shared office space being provided, either for free or very low rates, for those working in a creative capacity. A similar scheme with larger workshop/rehearsal space is certainly something to consider. Understandably, this is more challenging – as space increases, so do overheads. But there must be other companies feeling the same; if so,  maybe we should try doing something about it. Peter Brook said all it takes is an actor and an empty space for theatre to exist. There are certainly enough empty spaces in this country, maybe it’s time we started claiming them as our own. A co-operative of young theatre makers running a shared play space might seem like another idealistic notion, but it may be worth a try.

Find out more about Witness Theatre at www.witness-theatre.co.uk or follow them at @witnesstheatre.

Image of Lothian Road, Edinburgh by Lee Kindness.

“How’s mum?” Daniel asks his brother for the third time, or maybe it’s the fourth, or then again, it could be the fifth time, or is it the first time after all? New Celts writer Cameron Forbes’ Besides the Obvious relies on these surreal shifts of time and mind, mixing absurdist Beckettian language games with the quiet menace of Pinter to create a piece of promising, if eventually deflated, piece of new writing.

The premise is innocent enough. Successful sharp-suited lawyer Eddie (David Edment) visits his down-and-out photographer brother Daniel (Sean Langtree) for a cup of tea and catch up. Eddie is a hard-working lawyer, the “and son” of the family firm and firm favourite – or not. Maybe sister Kim’s the favourite, Kim who has left, Kim who wants to leave, etc.? Meanwhile, Daniel is a freelance photographer, currently undertaking a commission from the police to document corpses at crime scene. As you might have guessed, Eddie and Daniel do not get on.

Forbes’ script is an intricate and intriguing work – the brothers’ lives and memories converge and divide in complex patterns as anxieties loom large amongst small talk. The requisite round of niceties barely mask contained resentment as the brothers’ exchanges ricochet between petty insults and back-slapping childhood nostalgia trips. When Eddie’s assured exterior begins to dissolve, Daniel doesn’t show any mercy and an ordinary living room becomes an emotional minefield, full of quick-fire accusations and raging imprecations.

Yes, it may sound like your average domestic drama, but it soon becomes apparent this entire situation somehow exists beyond the usual borders of rationality and even human time – not a study of a siblings’ relationship but rather the deterioration of an apparently sane man’s mind. It takes (perhaps too much) dedicated attention to appreciate the subtlety of the script, which races forward, back and around again with a confidence which, if confusing, is nonetheless complimentary – Forbes clearly doesn’t feel the need to spell it out for us and it is an enjoyable challenge to piece together the narrative from what we are sparingly given. There are nicely sinister touches that reveal what really preoccupies the brothers, for they only seem to genuinely connect, laugh uproariously or come together in conspiratorial closeness when smirking at the memory of their father falling down the stairs, about broken hipbones, erotic asphyxiation and electric shocks throwing people clear across a room. A few neat staging devices hint cleverly at growing isolation and instability – for example, when Daniel offers his brother a drink but Eddie takes it out of his own jacket – a trick that works far better than the invasive and rather tacky use of siren noises to disrupt the dialogue.

Indeed, whilst the writing approaches greatness, Besides the Obvious is generally let down by an unimaginative staging. Though the actors build up a convincing rapport, attempts at naturalism end up jarring with the organised chaos of the content, and the abrupt ending erupts more into cliché than catastrophe. Let’s hope Cameron Forbes returns next year with a more cohesive piece to take a deserved place amongst Edinburgh’s most intriguing new writers.

*** – 3/5 stars

Beside The Obvious played at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.

As consummate storyteller Frances Hodgson Burnett recognised, stories make us feel alive. The best stories can haunt the senses and quicken the heart – an adrenalin shot to the imagination. Burnett also knew, like her fiercely inventive young heroine Sara Crewe, that stories are most powerful in the telling. It is this power, in the form of charming and immersive narrative, that is channelled by Fringe regulars Belt Up Theatre in their latest literary foray.

In what has become something of a trademark, Belt Up tell this particular story, sacred in the memory of little and not so little girls around the world, in a familiar yet bracing way. Jethro Compton’s play teases at and subverts our expectations, banking on the cultural currency of Burnett’s literary output and its legacy for many generations of children. Incorporating elements of Burnett’s biography and her other literary works, as well as mischievous nods to the film version of the novel it is working from, this is no straightforward adaptation.

The staging is likewise given a playful Belt Up twist. Gathered in intimately haphazard arrangements on the floor at the edges of the performance space, there is a quality of primary school story time to the company’s interaction with the audience. Removed from the inscribed formality of the traditional theatre auditorium and forced into childishly undignified positions, spectators shed their acquired inhibitions and enter happily into the spirit of play – two grown men even allow themselves to be chided into chasing one another around the room. Through such simple, evocative touches, gently transporting us back to childhood, Belt Up render the often tricky feat of interactivity seemingly effortless.

Set at ease and invited to dream, the imaginative step needed to fall headlong into Belt Up’s enchanting world is a barely perceptible one. Tightly enveloped in this thick blanket of storytelling, it is easy to appreciate, along with Serena Manteghi’s captivating Sara, why the lavish palaces of the mind might be preferable to the grey drudge of the everyday. There might be precious few happy endings in real life, but that does not stop us from pretending.

**** – 4/5 stars

A Little Princess plays at C Venues until 27 August, as part of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. More information can be found here.