The Joke


by Will Adamsdale with Brian Logan and Lloyd Hutchinson
Dates
21 Apr - 5 Jun 2016
Artist/Company
Various

Commissioned by Unity Theatre. Funded by Arts Council England.

AN ENGLISHMAN, IRISHMAN AND SCOTSMAN GOT TRAPPED IN A JOKE…

 

‘HOW DO WE GET OUT?’ SAID THE ENGLISHMAN

‘JUST STOP TELLING IT’ SAID THE IRISHMAN

‘BUT WE’RE TOO FAR IN!’ SAID THE SCOTSMAN

 

ALL THREE CHECKED THEIR PHONES FOR RECEPTION.

 

The Joke was a play from comedy award winner Will Adamsdale – and company – which explored jokes and why we tell them, countries and why we need (and despair of) them, and life and why we bother. And tic tacs.

Directing support from Joe Hill-Gibbins.

#TheJoke

FuelFest in Exeter:

In November 2017, Fuel packed up and headed down the M4 to Exeter for our first-ever city-wide FuelFest in partnership with The Bike Shed and The Phoenix.  During this week-long mini city-takeover, we presented a curated programme of theatre that was a true celebration of the breadth of our work.  FuelFest Exeter explored themes around identity, immigration, integration and the role of women.  There was puppetry and sea shanties, 3D binaural soundscapes and conversations with the future, discussion and debate in community centres, intimate experiences in the pitch dark and a night out for the whole family.

The line-up included:

  • The Hartlepool Monkey at Exeter Pheonix
  • Fiction at The Bike Shed Theatre Exeter
  • To Those Born Later at Wonford Community Centre Exeter
  • Portrait at The Bike Shed Exeter
  • An Evening with an Immigrant at The Bike Shed Exeter

It’s the Skin You’re Living In: the app:

Fevered Sleep present

It’s the Skin You’re Living In: the app

It’s the Skin You’re Living In explored and challenged images of climate change. It existed in three formats: a broadcast and online film; a miniature multi-screen installation; and a multi-user iPhone app (Co-produced with Fuel).

Shot in a series of locations from the islands of Svalbard in the High Arctic to a kitchen in a house in London – via the beaches and headlands of Barra and Vatersay in the Outer Hebrides, the M11 motorway, a dairy farm in Bedfordshire and the outskirts of Hackney and the Olympic Park – the project suggested that climate change wasn’t a matter just concerning distant landscapes and threatened animals, but as an ever-present part of everyone’s daily lives.

There is a man dressed like a bear; a polar bear. Sometimes he looks like a person dressed like a bear – human, fake – and sometimes he looks like he might actually be a bear – animal, real.  Over the course of a fragmented journey from the northern reaches of Europe, through Scotland, to the south of the UK, the bear-skin-costume is dismantled, revealing the man inside the animal.

It’s the Skin You’re Living In was an attempt to make images of climate change that reminded us of how profoundly we’re connected to both nature and culture, how we’re all undergoing change, on a journey, searching for a home. Its language is one of broken images, repeated actions and walking, walking, walking; a strange, sad and funny meditation on being human and being animal, lost in a changing world.

@feveredsleep

#fsSkin

Produced in association with Fuel.

Supported using public funding by Arts Council England with additional support from Esmée Fairbairn Foundation.

Creative Team

Director, Editor & sound: David Harradine

Production Manager: Ali Beale

Music: Danny Manners

Performer: Robin Dingemans

Costume: Jess Tiller

ABB73C5B-A51C-4932-BDF3-C60C9D79146A Created with sketchtool.

Project History