Behind the Scenes: Dawn Walton
Seriously...
BBC
4.1 • 885 Ratings
🗓️ 23 February 2018
⏱️ 32 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Dawn Walton, artistic director of Eclipse, the black theatre touring company, was bored of only ever coming across three black stories in British theatres - slavery stories, immigrant stories, and gang stories. She knew there was a far greater range of stories out there and she wanted to tell them. Revolution Mix is the result - a programme of new plays inspired by 500 years of black British history and it will be the largest ever presentation of black British stories performed in regional theatres.
In this intimate portrait of artistic director Dawn Walton, we follow her as she leads her company, Eclipse Theatre, to its premiere of the first play in her ground-breaking Revolution Mix programme - Black Men Walking. It's a new play inspired by a real-life black men's walking group in Sheffield. Not only does the play challenge clichéd representations of black people, it's also an experimental work fusing music, movement, and magic.
In this programme, as well as hearing from some of those involved in the production, we hear Dawn rehearsing her company, coping with a significant bereavement, discussing her life before entering the world of theatre, and finally sharing her ambitions for British theatre. Revolution Mix is an enterprising programme and in Dawn Walton it has a doughty champion.
Presenter: Ekene Akalawu Interviewed Guest: Dawn Walton Interviewed Guest: Ola Animashawun Interviewed Guest: Testament (aka Andy Brooks) Interviewed Guest: Dorcas Sebuyange Interviewed Guest: Tyrone Huggins Interviewed Guest: Trevor Laird Interviewed Guest: Tonderai Munyevu Producer: Ekene Akalawu.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This was an impregnable fortress. The only way you get out was in a wooden box. |
| 0:05.0 | The controversial maximum security prison impossible to escape from. |
| 0:09.0 | And one of the duties of a political prisoner is the escape. |
| 0:12.0 | The IRA inmates who found a way. of a political prisoner is the escape. |
| 0:12.5 | The IRA inmates who found a way. |
| 0:14.5 | I'm Carlo Gableer and I'll be navigating a path |
| 0:19.5 | through the disturbing inside story of the biggest jailbreak in British and Irish history. |
| 0:25.0 | The narrative that they want is that this is a big achievement by them. |
| 0:28.5 | Escape from the Maze, listen first on BBC Sounds. |
| 0:34.0 | This is the BBC. Sorry to interrupt your scheduled listening experience. |
| 0:48.0 | My name is Haley Campbell and I'm the host of UnPopped, |
| 0:51.0 | a new podcast that digs deep into pop culture. |
| 0:54.0 | Search for us and subscribe via your usual podcast, Supplier. |
| 0:59.0 | Hi, I'm Riana Dylan, and this is seriously. |
| 1:06.0 | Okay, so I think we should just dive into it. |
| 1:10.0 | Can we time this? |
| 1:12.0 | That's great. Okay. That's Dawn Walton. She's the artistic |
| 1:17.1 | director of a revolutionary theatre company and she's pulling back the curtain on her |
| 1:22.1 | most recent work. |
| 1:24.0 | Are they telling the audience that they walk? |
| 1:28.0 | Or are they telling the audience that the guys walk? What do they, you know what I mean. |
| 1:35.1 | In today's episode, we're with Dawn through the process of creating a new play called |
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