Ivan Cutting set to step down Two Sisters Arts Centre re-opens

Ivan Cutting is to step down as Artistic Director of Eastern Angles, the company he helped found in 1982.

In a statement, Cutting said, “I always intended to hand in my badge once the company had secured its new Arts Council NPO award for the next three years and had settled into its new home, the Eastern Angles Centre. Over the years I have worked with a vast array of people who have helped make the company the success it is today, and whose hard work and dedication I have depended on so often. It has been a privilege to work with them and to serve the communities of this vast and varied region.”

Eastern Angles, formed by five actors living in Suffolk, quickly made a name for itself on the rural touring circuit for its focus on an East Anglian sense of place and the use of documentary theatre techniques, which Cutting freely admits he copied from Peter Cheeseman’s work at the New Vic in Stoke-on-Trent. “People used to wonder whether we would run out of subjects,” says Cutting. “They don’t say that anymore”. The company toured to all four corners of the British Isles until its work in East Anglia expanded and took up more time. From the 90s onwards Cutting and his team began to produce large scale shows like The Wuffings performed in “the largest potting shed in Europe” and a series of new plays in the Hush House on the former Bentwaters Airbase. These days the company boasts of its ability to turn any space indoors or outdoors into a large auditorium with raked seating, a geodesic dome, and extensive sound and lighting rigs, whilst its touring circuit covers an area from Brentwood to Cromer and Peterborough to Lowestoft.

Its biggest hits have included Waterland (dir Hettie Macdonald), David Copperfield (dir Ivan Cutting), and most recently The Ballad of Maria Marten (dir Hal Chambers), although a personal favourite of Cutting is Parkway Dreams, the story of the Peterborough Development Corporation. “People said ‘We didn’t think we were going to like a play about town planning, but we loved it’”. Cutting relishes this audience reaction as it backs up his personal mission to ‘Take people on the journey they didn’t know they wanted to go on’.

In 2008, after one of the first Arts Council nights of the long knives, Eastern Angles were threatened with a cut to its funding as East

Colchester’s Mercury Theatre opens it’s new season with Run Rebel in a co-production between Mercury and Pilot Theatre, the award-winning company that brought Noughts and Crosses and The Bone Sparrow to the Colchester stage.

Tessa Walker directs the world première adaption of Manjeet

Mann’s Carnegie Medal-winning young adult novel, combining physical theatre and visual effects, and opening 2nd March, running until 4 March.

Opening next is a new Mercury Production of They Don’t Pay? We Won’t Pay!, Deborah McAndrew’s adaptation of Dario Fo’s Sotto paga? Non si paga!. Directed by Ryan McBryde, this ferociously funny political farce asks what lengths people will go to when they’re desperate to survive. The production opens on 22nd March, and runs until 31st March.

Next, Mercury Creatives alumni Mia Jerome brings a new Mercury Original to the stage in her uplifting children’s show The Instrumentals. As part of a UK tour, the show features soulful music, seventies grooves and innovative puppetry. The Instrumentals celebrates the way people hold memories, running in Mercury’s Studio Theatre from 30th May to 3rd June.

• For more information and to book tickets visit the Box office at www.mercurytheatre.co.uk

Anglia was deemed sub-regional, but the company fought back and embraced the city of Peterborough, where it now has a satellite base and second venue, The Undercroft. Cutting, 69, grew up in Ipswich, studied Drama at Bristol University and is about to direct a new translation of two medieval plays for his final project with Eastern Angles. Medieval Miracles will tour to East Anglian village halls, community centres, studio theatres and its own Sir John Mills theatre between March to May, finishing at the Peterborough Celebrates Festival. The Artistic Director will step down in November 2023 in the hope that a successor will be in place by September.

A fuller statement from Ivan Cutting is available on easternangles.co.uk/ news

The Two Sisters Arts Centre reopen for the new season on Friday 3rd March, 7pm with a packed evening featuring jazz from The Phil Veacock Trio, a specially written song from Triangle.

The evening will also see the unveiling of the specially commissioned art installation by special guest Radio Caroline’s Stephen ‘Foz’ Foster

On Saturday 11th March 7.30pm

Stephen Amer (Rogue Shanty Bouys/The Testosta Tones) brings Song Sung Blue - A tribute to the life and music of Neil Diamond.

Friday 17th March 7.30pm is drama with Brother Wolf & James Hyland performing Silver & Gold - their take on Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic novel Treasure Island.

Friday 24th March 7.30pm its indie folk with Rosewood - three members of the popular Hosepipe Band bring originals and classics from their folk repertoire. And on Friday 31st March 7.30pm there’s jazz with the guitars of Stringfellows.

Friday 3rd – 7.00pm (£14/£12)

GRAND RE-OPENING with Special Guest STEPHEN “FOZ” FOSTER Art commission unveiling and Jazz from THE PHIL VEACOCK TRIO

Saturday 11th - 7.30pm (£14/£12)

SONG SUNG BLUE

The Music of Neil Diamond

Friday 17th – 7.30pm (£14-£12)

JAMES HYLAND/BROTHER WOLF SILVER & GOLD

Friday 24th - 7.30pm (£14/£12)

Folk Night with ROSEWOOD

Friday 24th -7.30pm (£14/£12)

Jazz Guitar Quartet STRINGFELLOWS