Watch: HeadSpaceDance
The Shows Must Go On

Luca Silvestrini’s Double Bill with award-winning HeadSpaceDance has launched as part of Universal Pictures‘ The Shows Must Go On!

Two shows exploring the life of dancers on stage and behind the scenes told through Luca’s satirical dance theatre.

As part of this broadcast, we are kindly asking audiences to donate to Cancer Research UK, dedicated to saving lives through research, influence and information.

Watch After The Interval here from 30 April 2021:

Watch Before The Interval here from 7pm, 7 May 2021:

★★★★
“Funny and touching and very accessible, demystifying much of the jargon around ballet…”
The Evening Standard on If Play is Play…

Respectively created for Three and Four Quarters (2012) and If Play is Play… (2014), After the Interval and its sequel, Before the Interval, are Luca Silvestrini’s works for award-winning HeadSpaceDance curated as part of two programmes of new commissions and revivals from the likes of Javier de Frutos, Mats Ek, Didy Veldman, Matthew Dunster and Johan Inger. The programmes comprised a series of solos, duets and trios for Charlotte Broom, Christopher Akrill, Clemmie Sveaas, Jonathan Goddard and Gemma Nixon.  

Three and Four Quarters ran at the Linbury Studio Theatre for four nights in 2012 before going on tour in the UK. It was extremely well received by the press and public alike. This encouraged Akrill and Broom to forge ahead with their venture and to respond to the Royal Opera House’s suggestion of a second commissioned programme If Play is Play… in 2014 for which HeadSpaceDance invited Silvestrini back. 

After the Interval pins Silvestrini’s observational genius to satirising dancing life. A show about dance and dancers that opens with the performers’ curtain calls, who then answer audience questions, and continues with revivals of their past stage roles and steps. After the Interval brings to the fore the art of dance making and the backstage lives of dancers while celebrating Broom/Akrill’s 20 years joint career and the start of their company HeadSpaceDance.

“There aren’t many dancers around who could carry this piece [After the Interval] off and strike the requisite bittersweet note, but these three can and do. They’re very, very good together” 
Luke Jennings, The Guardian

Before the Interval imposed itself as the obvious title for this second commission in which Akrill, Goddard and Sveaas take Broom’s absence as a cue to promote their own talents as dancer-directors, projecting themselves into what their future selves could be. Using Silvestrini’s style of humorous, satirical dance theatre, they speak their thoughts about their potential careers, audience expectations and hold conversations as they simultaneously move.

“Defying the odds with a philosophy and style of performance unlike any I’ve seen” 
Judith Mackrell, The Guardian

Running time 70 mins
English subtitles available
Performers: Christopher Akrill, Charlotte Broom, Jonathan Goddard and Clemmie Sveaas
Footage courtesy of the Royal Opera House

This online broadcast is part of our Protein 21 Remix Series which brings back historical works onto a digital stage to help us take some distance with the present and provide a social and individual perspective on society, interpersonal connections and the everyday.

In order to support artists in these difficult times, Protein will be passing the entire broadcast fee to them. Thank you for supporting Protein.

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