Andrew Visnevski, founder and creator of The Cherub Company London, launched THEATRE ALIVE! in 1995. This unique cultural and post-training and apprenticeship scheme has assisted young performers, designers, composers and technicians to achieve success in their chosen profession.

THE HISTORY OF THEATRE ALIVE!

2019 to the present day

Kalamata Drama International Summer School (KaDISS)

The Kalamata Drama International Summer School (KaDISS) is a structured and intensive 3-week acting course, taught in English, held annually in the city of Kalamata.

KaDISS is being run by Theatre Alive! in association with the Maria Callas Alumni Association of the Music School of Kalamata.

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2017

OPIUM

Premièred at the RADA Festival Gielgud Theatre, 28th and 30th June 2017

In 1928, Jean Cocteau – already a legend of French cultural life and friend to Proust, Picasso, Stravinsky, Man Ray and Lee Miller among others – checked himself into a clinic in order to be cured of an uncontrollable addiction to opium. At the same time, in another room of the clinic, his lover Jean Desbordes was being treated for the same addiction. During that time, Cocteau kept a diary of his nightmarish cure, together with a series of revealing and unsettling drawings.

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2016/2017

MACBETH. A DIALOGUE

Bloomsbury Festival, 2016; Royal Ballet School, Covent Garden and Juju's Bar and Stage, London 2017

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2014

JOURNAL D'UN FOU

Avignon International Festival, France

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2012

PHAEDRA

Theatre Alive! in association with Théâtre re, featuring mime actor Guillaume Pigé

Phaedra, the wife of Theseus, is driven by an uncontrollable lust for her young stepson. Rejected and isolated, she has planned a terrible revenge. This modern retelling of the ancient Greek tragedy is performed by one man. Words, music, images and dance intertwine to lead us down the dark alleyways of sexual obsession. Written by a man, dedicated to a man, directed by a man, and performed by a man – this is an attempt, through men’s eyes, to enter the soul of a woman tormented by unlawful desire.

PHAEDRA was performed at The Cockpit Theatre (Gateforth Street, Marylebone, London, NW8 8EH) as part of 2012 The CockSquat Festival.

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2010

DIARY OF A MADMAN

Drill Hall, London 2010 and Mayfield Festival 2010

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ΗΜΕΡΟΛΟΓΙΟ ΤΟΥ ΤΡΕΛΛΟΥ (DIARY OF A MADMAN)

National Theatre of Albania, Tirane 2010

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2008

THEATRE ALIVE! in a creative partnership with SLEEPING DOGS THEATRE produced a stunning production of The Drowned World by Gary Owen.

A spine-tingling story of four people whose lives twist together in a devastating tale of love, sexual desire, identity and betrayal in a bleak world where the state is omniscient.

In Gary Owen's electrifying play, individualism, here portrayed as beauty, is viciously eradicated by a totalitarian state. A daring and exciting fusion of poetic prose with shocking realism combines to create a haunting Orwellian landscape that strikes a chord in today’s society where image is, arguably, more important to the ambitious politician than sincere policies.

Director - Andrew Visnevski

Designer – Prav Menon-Johansson

Assistant to the Director- Guillaume Pigé

Cellist – Laurie Jamieson

The Drowned World toured to:

Guildhall Arts Centre, Grantham, Lincs
Terry O'Toole Theatre, North Hykeham, Lincs
Olympus Theatre, Filton College, Bristol
Jacksons Lane Theatre, Highgate, London

2006

In May, THEATRE ALIVE! in association with the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art presented a new 100-minute production with live music of Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale, especially commissioned by the 2006 Mayfield Festival, at Mayfield and at Eastbourne College.

The core of the company was made up of recent RADA graduates with veteran Cherub Company member Russell Kennedy as Autolycus/Time. The production formed the basis of an educational and self-management THEATRE ALIVE! programme run by new professionals in theatre-associated arts. Directed by Andrew Visnevski, designed by Sam Lerner, music composed by Russell Hepplewhite and movement by Francine Watson-Coleman.

On 30th June and 1st July 2006 at the Drill Hall, London, THEATRE ALIVE! presented a rehearsed reading of The Oresteia Trilogy. This new verse translation and adaptation by Joseph Coelho was a THEATRE ALIVE! commission made possible by a grant from the Arts Council England and sponsorship from The Drill Hall, the London Centre for Theatre Studies, Jenny MacDonald and THEATRE ALIVE! It was the culmination of the first stage of The Oresteia Peace Project - an on-going development of the central piece of European Theatre into an opera to be performed by young people for young people.

2004

THE CHERUB COMPANY LONDON, on behalf of THEATRE ALIVE!, supported an application to Awards for All by Linda Marlowe, actress and writer, for a new educational programme to be toured in 2004/5.

DEBUT THEATRE COMPANY in association with THE CHERUB COMPANY LONDON presented three productions at the 2004 Edinburgh Festival Fringe: a new adaptation of George Orwell’s NINETEEN EIGHT-FOUR, and two original plays, SHOSTAKOVICH and THESE FOUR WALLS by new writer, Ciaran McConville. THESE FOUR WALLS transferred to the Soho Theatre, London, for a special performance on 24 September 2004.

2003

The 2003 season at the Menier Chocolate Factory, Southwark, consisted of a repertoire of two plays: AKHMATOVA'S SALTED HERRING, a specially commissioned new play by Jeff Lewis and the other, a new dramatisation by Andrew Visnevski of Mikhail Bulgakov's cult novel, THE MASTER AND MARGARITA.

2002

The Acting Company in association with The Cherub Company London presented THE BALCONY by Jean Genet, also directed by Andrew Visnevski and produced at The Tabard Theatre, London.

2000

THEATRE ALIVE! facilitated a production of Alfred Lord Tennyson’s MAUD starring Sebastian Harcombe and directed by Martin Oelbermann at the Victorian Arches of St Pancras Station.

1998

The Cherub Company London in collaboration with The Acting Company presented THE LIFE OF EDWARD THE SECOND OF ENGLAND by Bertolt Brecht on National Tour including the Battersea Arts Centre, The Place Theatre, and Riverside Studios in London.

The Acting Company in association with The Cherub Company London presented Shakespeare's THE MERCHANT OF VENICE at the Lyric Studio Hammersmith, London.

1997

Edinburgh Festival Fringe production by The Cherub Company London of Vi Marriott's TEN DAYS A-MAZE, or THE PRODIGIOUS MYSTERIES OF THE SARAGOSSA MANUSCRIPT involved the Director Andrew Visnevski, Musical Director Julian Dawes and Co-Director/Commedia Master Stephen Hutton in training most of the cast as well as in guiding them in this professional performance.

1996

THE PUPPET THEATRE OF DON CRISTÓBAL and THE LOVE OF DON PERLIMPLIN AND BELISSA IN THE GARDEN by Federico Garcia Lorca, directed by Andrew Visnevski. Transferred from the New End Theatre where it was presented by The Acting Company (the one-year post-graduate course in acting at The Arts Educational School London), for a professional season at the Canal Café Theatre under the banner of THEATRE ALIVE!

Shakespeare's THE TEMPEST by The Cherub Company London: the cast consisted of former and graduating students from the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, The Arts Educational School London, and The Acting Company. The Director Andrew Visnevski, Musical Director Julian Dawes and Voice Master William Trotter, who had worked with some or all of the young performers in training, were now guiding them in this professional production - for several their first. The production toured nationally and was invited to the Antwerp International Festival in Belgium.

The British première of IN THE SOLITUDE OF THE COTTON FIELDS by Bernard Maria Koltés, directed by Kimon Koufogiannis, was produced for the Edinburgh Festival Fringe under the umbrella of THEATRE ALIVE!

Theatre Alive! Production Credits