THE OTHER ROOM | STAGE PREVIEW

‘Life In Close Up’ is the theme of The Other Room’s first season. “It will take people we would rather not believe in, and bring them so close we can hear them breathing.” Literally. Cardiff’s first pub theatre have found their home in a small side-room of Porter’s, and it plans to bring audiences and performers into very close quarters.

Last night, in is this brand new pub theatre, the people behind The Other Room announced their first round of productions. With three plays bringing to life what we would rather shy from, their opening season looks set to be intense, and visceral.

The season opens with Sarah Kane’s Blasted (Sat 17 Feb–Tue 07 Mar) which shook audiences and appalled critics in equal measure when it premiered at The Royal Court in 1995. It is a brutal portrait of the realities of war set within the confines of a hotel room in Leeds.

Blasted is followed by The Dying of Today (Tue 24 Mar – Sat 04 Apr). A man walks into a barbershop with the worst news there has ever been. This is the story of the military defeat which led to the fall of Athens in 413BC.

The Other Room’s first ever season ends with A Good Clean Heart (Tue 28 Apr – Sat 16 May)– a bilingual show by new playwright Alun Saunders. It is a coming of age story about two brothers raised apart, in different families speaking different languages. It is a study into how much language, and to an extent, geography, affect and define who we are.

words LAUREN SOURBUTTS

Info: www.otherroomtheatre.com