Sixty people on a studio stage, hemmed on three sides by audience – they surge, they pulse; they shimmer like a shoal of fish changing direction, shiver into contraflowing eddies; they charge, roar, confront; trickle away, surge a return. So many in so small an area, it's a rare sight. Rarer still is the way that each performer (whether aged 12 or 85 or some point between) lights up this shifting space, simultaneously individual and collective. The "Tiny Plays" (there are actually 21, by 18 playwrights) seem to rise from and fall back into this stream of people in an evocative illustration of the intermingling currents of city life (kept bubbling along by Nick Greenhill's rhythmic sound design).
This aspect of Sheffield People's Theatre's second production is magnificent – a melding of the talents of local residents and theatre professionals*, particularly director Andrew Loretto and movement director Lucy Cullingford (under overall artistic direction of Daniel Evans). Tom Rogers's multi-level design and Gary Longfield's lighting suggest the city, its river and hilly surroundings, via a stone-brick-cement back wall, punctuated by windows and doors, on to which shine projections of water or of words. The setting, specific but not limiting, allows actors the freedom to create the sites for each play through gesture and interaction.
The core idea of the piece, though, is flawed. There are too many plays, and too many rely on the same techniques – of lists and repetitions (how many disjointed headlines can one audience take?) With so much that is good, the evening feels long.
*Writers: Chris Bush, Helen Eastman, Tim Etchells, Sally Goldsmith, Pete Goodland, Russell Hepplewhite, Richard Hurford, Marcia Layne, Tom Lodge, Andrew McMillan, D C Moore, Kaite O'Reilly, Laurence Peacock, Michael Stewart, Stephanie Street, Andrew Thompson, Chris Thorpe, Louise Wallwein
Performers: Tanya Addy, Billy Ashcroft, Jonny Aubrey-Bentley, Jalleh Bahraini, Jessica Barber, Thomas Barker, Sue Beardon, Ellen Bowes, Elliot Brown, David Burchhardt, Sue Burgess, Michaela Caine, Jean Cherry, Samuel Child-Cavill, Joseph Clarkson, Lily Coates, Ned Cooper, Dominic Corfield, Archana Dait, Jennifer Derbyshire, Chidora Ekebuisi, Annie Etchell, Shelby Foster, Becky Frankham, Carmen Franklin, Imogen Gledhill, Paris Guest, Billy Hinchliff, Emily Hurst, Adele Hodson, Keith Khabo, Sean Longmore, Mariah Louca, Clare McManus, Ryan Meehan, Alison Mitchell, James Morley, Leo Peace, Stephen Peace, Satu Pihlstrom, Matthew Plant, Andrew Raftery, David Ridley, Janice Sampson, Estella Smith, Alex Smith, Samuel Smithson, Kate Spivey, Leonora Stavrianakos, Rosa Strong, Anya Sweetland, Jonathan Syer, Robert Turner, Christian Vernon, Bryn Walker, George Webster, Aileen Westoby, Scott Westoby, Jason Wild, Kyle Williams
Musical direction (and performance): Moony Wainwright
