The place is windowless.
Devising it all for Company is an intimate solo performance of Samuel Beckett’s 1979 novella Company, conceived and performed by Valerie McCann at Typewriters Anonymous' space at The Brewery Art Lofts. This immersive installation invites the audience into a shared mind, where a decentered, refracted self pushes up against an unreliable reality. McCann engages ritualistic physical practices with precise choreographic scoring to attempt an improvised performance of word perfect text.
You were once. You were never. Were you ever? Oh never to have been! Be again.
Audiences will be limited to 13 participants for each performance. There will be a variety of seating and reclining options, including chairs, cushions, and a soft padded floor. Audiences are invited to remove shoes, get comfortable, and change positions when your body asks you to. The piece runs about 2 hours. You may exit and re-enter as needed.
Which of all imaginable positions has the most to offer in the way of company.
Developed over several years with rehearsal space support from London Performance Studios and New Theater Hollywood, and through a residency at CultureHub LA in collaboration with Raquel Bell and Jared Marshall of Galecstasy. Additional dramaturgical research and development support from Jeanine Durning. Presented through special arrangement with Georges Borchardt, Inc. on behalf of the Estate of Samuel Beckett.
And in another dark or in the same another devising it all for company.
About the Artist
Valerie McCann is an invisibly and dynamically disabled body- and time-based artist, facilitator and researcher. As a performer and co-conspirator, she dances across traditional theatre, choreographic and performance art disciplines. With home bases in Los Angeles and London, Valerie works collaboratively with artists and ensembles across the US, UK and EU. In Los Angeles Valerie was a founding member of ARTEL. She has trained extensively in the Viewpoints with Mary Overlie, the Six Viewpoints Institute, and SITI Company, and serves on the board of the SITI Alumni Association. She is an original member of London Performance Studio’s resident company, The Director’s Theatre Writer’s Theater. Her solo works explore the intersection of classic texts and post modern choreographies. Valerie is also a daily yoga practitioner of more than twenty years and is a sought after instructor of Original Hot Yoga. As an embodied researcher, Val’s interest lives in the space where rigour meets reality, reimagining methodologies through the lens of relational experience.