Quarantine, Manchester’s leading experimental theatre company, has been appointed our Associate Company. Regarded as being at the cutting-edge of the alternative British theatre scene since being established in Manchester in 1998 by artistic directors Richard Gregory and Renny O’Shea, and designer Simon Banham, Quarantine are internationally acclaimed for their experiments with everyday life.
With performances staged at venues in the UK and across the world, ranging from private homes to major theatres to a warehouse in an industrial estate in Salford, the company have made family parties, karaoke booths, cookery lessons, radio broadcasts and journeys in the dark for one person at a time – as well as performances on stage for audiences in seats.
Quarantine presented The Reading Room at Chaos to Order at Manchester’s Central Library in November 2014, and their No Such Thing project – buying strangers a curry in exchange for a conversation – takes place in the city centre Kabana café every month.
As part of Quarantine’s partnership with us, the company are developing their new production Wallflower, a dance marathon in which three performers are challenged to remember every dance they’ve ever danced. Quarantine will be trying out Wallflower in front of an invited audience on Thu 20 – Sat 22 August, prior to its world premiere at the Noorderzon Performing Arts Festival, Groningen, Holland (Fri 28 – Sun 30 August 2015).
Invitations for the try-out performances will be sent out via Quarantine’s mailing list. Places are extremely limited and will be issued on a first come first served basis.
“We’re delighted to be appointed as HOME’s first Associate Company,” says Richard Gregory, Quarantine co-founder and director of Wallflower. “Quarantine have been making work in Manchester for almost 20 years and it’s an exciting place to be an artist right now. We’re living through times of great challenge and rapid change. Theatre’s role in society is – rightly – both open to question and full of potential.
“HOME represents a new platform for world-class art in the city, and we look forward to working with them and helping to respond to this moment with ambitious new ideas, keeping our feet on the ground in this city and our eyes on the world.”
“Manchester has a thriving home-grown theatre scene,” says Walter Meierjohann, our Artistic Director: Theatre, “and this partnership with such a well renowned Manchester theatre company underlines our commitment to working with, and being part of, that local environment.
“Quarantine’s work has always impressed me with its vision and scope, and the partnership offers our audiences the chance to see one of the city’s leading theatre companies at HOME and venues throughout the city.”