Pushing Dramaturgy

 PUSH 

Pleasance Festival Online 

Friday 6th August – Monday 30th August 2021 

A hell of a lot can happen in the time you await the results of a pregnancy test. PUSH is the story  of a woman staring down the barrel of motherhood, torn between her own ambivalence and an  uncontrollable urge to push. 

Award-winning Popelei have burst out of isolation and onto our screens with their darkly comic  theatre production, reimagined for film after its preview at VAULT Festival 2020. Fusing theatre,  movement and dance the company have embraced this new medium, collaborating with  cinematographer Jack Offord. With blistering honesty, exhilarating choreography, and one  extremely knocked-up performer this is an engaging, expressive performance...a show that  captures the blizzard of feelings parents have for their as-yet-unborn children (The Guardian). 

And for the first predictable question: what was the inspiration for your show?

PUSH kind of snuck up on us. Our 2019 show, 100 Years, explored maternal lineage across a century of history and two continents. We were in the rehearsal room, thinking about taking 100 Years further, when we found ourselves asking - what happens if we let go of this epic lens and instead look at a much more condensed moment of motherhood? So with PUSH we’re at the complete other end of the spectrum, exploring just three minutes in time as one woman awaits the results of her pregnancy test.

How far does it fit within your usual work, and do you have a particular dramaturgical approach to creating a production?

 

Our last three stage productions have all been one-person shows, so that’s a thread that runs through our work. There is something inherently good about the direct and playful relationship you can have between audience and performer in a one-person show.  We’re  open to different forms and have a very fluid, collaborative practice. We tend to design the process and the dramaturgical approach around the ideas behind each show and the people involved - rather than work to a strict structure.

 

PUSH is Popelei’s first film production. Our crew included film and theatre specialists,

which really helped with developing a way of working that honoured the energy and theatricality of the original production.  As well as revisiting digital in the future, we are keen to build on the momentum of our 2020 Women in Lockdown project: a series of 25 original monologues curated from an open call for new work, supported by the Popelei Seed Commission.

 

Do you see your work within any particular tradition?

Tamsin trained at LeCoq in Paris, and European physical theatre is certainly an influence. Right now, we’re mostly excited to be part of the very current movement of female-led and feminist work in the UK.

What are you hoping that the audience will experience?

 

The same invigorating frenzy of feelings that you get from a live show.

 

How have you found the challenge of creating a production online? Has it been positive or negative and have there been any surprises?

 

Reimagining the stage show of PUSH as a film - that can be accessed digitally at Edfringe - has been hugely positive. It gave us an opportunity to build new collaborations with an insanely clever team of Bristol-based filmmakers, including cinematographer Jack Offord, and really dig into the risks and opportunities of a very different medium. We filmed PUSH in one long and continuous take, in a bid to capture the liveness of Tamsin Hurtado Clarke’s performance, and the energy needed from Tamsin and from every single member of the crew to complete this was a big challenge and a massive adrenaline rush.

 

I have always asked about the role of theatre in public debate, but this now seems even more relevant. In the current landscape, what does theatre or performance have to give to the public sphere?

During all this instability and upheaval, hopefully theatre remains one of the more solid spaces in which to connect with each other and, as importantly, ourselves.

PUSH was written in response to the difficulty faced as a woman in her 30s trying to separate  your own life choices from the sense of a biological ticking clock, and the eternal question of  whether to try to become a parent. It was created out of a desire to see the seemingly  mundane moments of a woman’s life portrayed and explored on a grander scale. Here, the  three-minute panic of waiting for the results of a pregnancy test transforms into a full-scale  existential crisis, pulling in physical theatre and dance to express the broad range of complicated  emotions.  

Director Scarlett Plouviez comments, figuring out if, how and when to have a baby has never  been easy. The last year has complicated this even further for many - dating in a time of social  distancing, cancelled fertility appointments, money problems, moving back in with your parents,  the climate crisis...the list goes on. PUSH doesn’t pretend to have an answer to any of this, but  instead holds a mirror up to what it can feel like to experience a sliding-doors moment in your  life, looking down at a pregnancy test and wondering what it is exactly that you want. 

Popelei is an ongoing collaboration between writer-performer Tamsin Hurtado Clarke and  writer-director Scarlett Plouviez, seeking to make performances that are authentic, energetic and hopeful, reflecting the world as they experience it and want it to be. PUSH features an  original soundtrack by a regular Popelei collaborator, the renowned Chilean film and stage  composer Santiago Jara Astaburuaga. 

Title PUSH 

Performance Dates Friday 6th – Monday 30th August 2021 

Available on demand 

Running time 40 minutes 

Created by Popelei 

Performer Tamsin Hurtado Clarke 

Director Scarlett Plouviez 

Producer Penelope Saward 

Composer/Sound Designer Santiago Jara Astaburuaga 

Cinematographer Jack Offord 

Sound Recordist Graeme Willetts 

Assistant Director Anja Kulessa