YORK theatre company BadApple is mounting a national tour of Fighting The Tide, a new musical play by Kate Bramley, bound for Oak House, Pocklington Civic Arts Centre on February 2.
Bramley, a writer and director for Hull Truck Theatre Company, has based her magical tale on a real-life trawling story from the North East, blending fact and fiction, truth and illusion, history and theatre magic.
Fighting The Tide is set in a maritime world where the waters are rising, daily life is threatened and the island postman has a problem. There is no post. When a mysterious boat appears in the street, what do the hands of fate have in store? Adrift on a sea of dreams and out of his depth, will the postman ever make it home?
The heroes of Bramley's musical drama are ordinary folk forced to seek a living on the seas, the men seduced by the big blue, lulled by the songs of sirens. From the glittering silver haul to the smoky steel of the docklands, trapped in the nets of the industrial age, the fishermen fight on in search of the best fish.
The survival story of Fighting The Tide is the latest in a series of biographical dramas by BadApple, which as headquarters in St Mary's, York. This time, for a co-production with the Trinity Arts Theatre in Tunbridge Wells, the company has commissioned ten new songs from Jez Lowe, the County Durham folk singer-songwriter.
Lowe, of Peterlee, is no stranger to social comment. His songs of life in the North East have taken the images and characters of ex-mining communities to audiences worldwide.
Kate Bramley, 25, has been artistic associate at Hull Truck for three years, working with artistic director John Godber. Last season, she directed David Hare's The Blue Room and she adapted Christopher Marlowe's Dr Faustus.
Bramley started BadApple Theatre Company in 1997 to take her debut piece, Amy Johnson, to the Edinburgh Fringe. It was an apt choice for a company's launch pad, given the subject matter: the turbulent life of the pioneering aviatrix from Hull.
Her second show for BadApple, Marlowe, Meet Raymond Chandler, drew on the life of detective novelist Raymond Chandler and, like Fighting The Tide, it bonded fact with fiction.
Tickets for the 7.30pm show in Pocklington cost £6.50, concessions £5.50, under 18s £3.50. To book, ring 01759 301547.
Updated: 09:43 Friday, January 25, 2002
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