“It’s Been Five Years, Dog!”
Our recent performance of The Man Who Planted Trees (the 100th of this North American tour) at the Millennium Place Theatre in Whistler marked the 5th anniversary of touring with this show. There is snow on the mountains of British Columbia and it’s a long way in terms of ocean, altitude and years of accumulated experience since we first performed The Man Who Planted Trees at the Columcille Centre in Morningside in May 2006.
At that time, we had six shows scheduled at various schools, summer festivals and outdoor events followed by a Fringe run to round things off. Little did we know that that was just the beginning. Approaching 1,500 performances later, it’s still a rewarding and enjoyable experience to tell Jean Giono’s story to each new audience. Dog’s repertoire of jokes and insights has expanded, the set has undergone a rolling restoration, and the original costumes still fit (at a squeeze!).
To mark the 5th birthday we have made a video montage of photos from many wonderful, varied tour locations. We weren’t able to include each venue but it’s a tribute to everyone whose support has kept the show on the road.
And while we’ve been thinking for a while that ‘the next show’ will be about one of Scotland’s most influential sons, we’ve just recently given our ideas a working title – America in the Morning: John Muir – One Wild and Precious Life.
John Muir was a man of extraordinary talents, including one for getting himself into (and usually out of) apparently impossible situations. He would become a world-famous naturalist, explorer, inventor of bizarre machines, a prolific writer and pioneer of the conservation movement, but in 1849 he was an eleven year old schoolboy with an insatiable thirst for adventure, living in a small town in Scotland, when one evening his father announced “We’re gan to America the morn!”
Development time will fit in around existing Man Who Planted Trees dates which include a 2-week 2011 Edinburgh Fringe run, our first performances of the show in French at the puppetry festival in Charleville, a Fall USA tour with a return to the Lincoln Center Institute, and a Spring 2012 North America tour. We plan to premiere the new show at the Fringe in 2012. We’re interested in new and existing partnerships for this project and continue to work with our agents Holden & Arts for North American touring.
Meanwhile, many thanks again to everyone who has played a part in this semi-scripted, semi-improvised adventure. If you’d like to stay tuned, see the links below where you can ‘like’ us on facebook, subscribe to our blog or have a look at our website (which we promise will look substantially more groovy come festival time!).
Oh and what about those pictures from Seattle that we promised? Here’s a selection with wistful music evoking the (admittedly only occasionally) wet weather of Washington State by the wonderful, Edinburgh-based singer songwriter Emily Scott.
[wpvideo 6RG8bMiq]
And where are our next public shows? In the USA, it’s St Paul, Minnesota on 4th & 5th June. And in the UK, it’s in Bristol at the World Stage Festival 8-10th July.
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Thanks for swinging by!