Waterlitz set to wow crowds at the Out There Festival

Great Yarmouth goes zany for Out There Festival

Simon Parkin Tuesday, September 4, 2012
9:32 AM

Out There Festival assembles a zany, worldwide cast of international streets artists, circus performers and assorted strange happenings in Great Yarmouth. SIMON PARKIN previews what promises to be a very weird week.

Expect the unexpected as weird and wonderful acts from across the globe entertain the crowds in Great Yarmouth next week as the town hosts the fifth Out There International Festival of Street Arts and Circus.

Now the largest festival of its kind in the region, this year the festival is bigger than ever this year. It has been expanded from its previous two-day weekend programme to a five day long extravaganza of the amazing and down right odd, running from September 4-9.

Now the largest festival of its kind in the region, it has rapidly gained an international reputation that helps to create a very cosmopolitan feel to this most traditional of seaside resorts.

Organisers Seachange Arts have developed the festival from a small mixed arts programme in 2008 to one now focused on circus and street arts, and a key date on the international calendar. The festival forms the showcase of an ambitious new circus quarter as Seachange look to position Yarmouth as a national capital for street arts and circus.

The town’s market place and Regent Road will host afternoon shows including the amazing acrobatics of two French companies, Cirque Inextremiste and Compagnie Bam.

Mattress Circus, a London-based trio with artists from Denmark and Portugal will perform a comedy circus show following the journey of three clowns, while local volunteers and dancers’ work will be shown alongside Latin American professionals in a new carnival show, Amazonas Spectacular, on Friday.

Friday evening sees another first for the festival as Out There goes inside at the town’s historic Hippodrome. Compagine Bam, one of France’s brightest young circus companies perform Switch, a spellbinding rock‘n’roll circus show.

Saturday night’s headline show is Waterlitz by Marseille based Générik Vapeur. They return to the town after entertaining thousands with Bivouac, their wandering tribe of punk rock blue men in 2010.

The centrepiece of Waterlitz is a 20m high iron giant constructed from shipping containers. Towering over the seafront, it will be brought to life in a show co-commissioned by Seachange.

Waterlitz will feature Générik Vapeur’s signature mix of stunning light show, rock music, pyrotechnics and anarchic theatre that has helped establish them as one of the world’s most celebrated street arts companies.

Fellow Marseille residents Les Studio de Cirque are one of the highlights in St George’s Park over the weekend. The Wheel of Death is a daredevil show performed high above the crowds on a spinning wheel. Belgium’s Les P’Tits Bras bring a comedy show, Triplette, styled on the silent movies of Charlie Chaplin, and San Francisco’s Pete Sweet mixes slack rope antics with jazz and juggling.

The festival was partly established to help bring together the growing migrant communities resident in Yarmouth — after all we all like to watch a kaleidoscope of colourful and creative shows.

“The ethos of the festival has always been about celebrating different cultures and communities,” says Seachange Art’s chief executive Joe Mackintosh. “Street arts and circus, by their nature, tend to be immediately accessible, allowing audiences from all backgrounds to come together to enjoy.”

The success of the festival is down, in part, to the way Seachange Arts has established itself within a number of significant European partnerships.

This year they have no less than five significant projects under way with festivals, producers and artists in France, the Netherlands, Ireland and Spain.

“The European partnerships are important,” explains Mackintosh. “On the continent, street arts and circus tend to be better supported, more developed in their structure. These partnerships have allowed us to build important relationships, develop our own expertise and provide opportunities to support a number of local artists in their professional development.”

Seachange recently secured £180,000 to help ambitious plans to develop the town as an international centre for circus and street arts and has taken over their first dedicated premises. The Drill House will become an international centre for street arts and circus, offering opportunities and world class facilities to local people and artists as well as attracting international companies to work there.

The town’s newly refurbished St George’s theatre is also set to host regular circus events in its indoor and outdoor spaces.

The Drill House has already seen local people working with this year’s festival artists. Volunteers have created a giant carnival float with award winning Columbian artist, Raul Ordonez and will join local dancers in a show, Amazonas Spectacular to be performed at the festival.

The festival’s reputation has quickly spread and increasing numbers of people are now journeying ‘out there’ to Yarmouth with around 60,000 people attending last year, and , due to its extended five-day format, many more extended to flock to see something very different this year.

“We’re now attracting a growing number of people who are visiting from outside the county, specifically for the festival. Many return each year and we’re now one of the most significant circus and street arts festivals in the country,” explains Mackintosh.

Out There is meant to compliment Yarmouth’s traditional entertainment provision, he adds. And this year they are again teaming up with Yarmouth’s historic Hippodrome, the country’s last purpose built circus building. It will host one of France’s brightest young circus companies Compagnie Bam alongside their own traditional Summer Spectacular programme which already features international acts from Russia, the Ukraine, Moldovia and Romania.

Their spellbinding show, Switch fuses elements of traditional and contemporary circus with a rock‘n’roll attitude. Breathtaking acrobatics performed on teeterboard and Chinese pole are delivered in a fast paced show packed with humour, driving rhythms, music and singing. The potent mix of performance and music takes the essential elements of traditional circus and re-energises them, providing a contemporary perspective that will appeal to all the family.

“We’re delighted to be part of the Out There Festival this year,” says the Hippodrome’s Peter Jay. “Circus is enjoying a tremendous revival and Great Yarmouth is fast becoming the UK’s circus capital.

“With such a varied line-up of the multi-faceted circus acts, nowhere else in the country can you see such a varied line-up in the space of a few days.”

Compagnie Bam is the second French company to visit the Hippodrome in a matter of months. In May, Out There Festival organisers, Seachange Arts brought Compagnie XY to Great Yarmouth as part of the Norfolk and Norwich Festival.

“Compagnie XY’s visit was immensely popular,” says Mackintosh. “The Hippodrome was packed with people of all ages, delighting in the sensational skills of these artists. After more than an hour of some of the most breathtaking circus, they showed their appreciation with a standing ovation!”

During the festival, Seachange’s international circus school partnership will also be celebrated with performances from students of their own school alongside those from France and Spain, and Dutch street arts company Close Act return to the festival with two shows that will feature giant stilt-walking insects and drumming figures.

The festival also features some of the UK’s finest performers including Abi Collins’s cheeky comedy cabaret, Ramshacklicious’s weird and wonderful Fink Soup, and a host of comedy creations from Markmark Productions including Abba-obsessed Vikings and Olympic-inspired 70s pop stars, Team BGee.

There’s plenty for all the family with some shows specifically for younger audiences. Squashbox Theatre’s delightful Sea Show is a quirky mix of natural history and comedy.

Rannell’s Flhip Flhop brings slapstick beatboxing painters to the festival and Pangottic’s Thingmabob fuses circus, comedy and crazy contraptions.

t Out There Festival runs from September 4-9, based mainly ion St George’s Park, Yarmouth, and at various locations around the town.

t Most performances are free, but Compagnie Bam’s Switch at Yarmouth Hippodrome, September 7 (7.30pm), is ticketed, £10 (£8 cons), 01493 844172, www.hippodromecircus.co.uk

t For a full list of performances and times visit: www.outtherefestival.com

OUT THERE HIGHLIGHTS

SWITCH

Yarmouth Hippodrome, September 7

Based in Amiens, Compagnie Bam was formed from graduates of France’s prestigious circus school of Chalon. Switch brings the circus ring to life with teeterboard, Chinese pole and breathtaking acrobatics. A fast paced show packed with humour, driving rhythms and singing.

LES P’TITS BRAS