The Playwrights Database
THEATRE OF MISTAKES
Nationality: n/aemail: n/a Website: n/a
Literary Agent: n/a
The Theatre of Mistakes 1970s-1980s, London was a performance art company. The work was minimalist, structuralist, and conceptual
Buy Plays with Doollee
Each page of doollee.com has links to play/book outlets, either directly to the Publisher, through Stageplays.com and Amazon to the second hand and 1st editions of AbeBooks. These links will automatically take you to the relevant area obviating the need for further search.AbeBooks.co.uk AbeBooks.com Stageplays.com amazon.com
amazon.co.uk
amazon.ca
whether you are a Playwright who wishes to make their entry definitive, an unlisted Playwright or a User with a tale to tell - we want to hear from you.
download WORD submission template
below is a list of Theatre Of Mistakes's plays - click on a Play Title for more information
Going Homage to Morandi Orpheus And Hermes Street, The Waterfall, AGoing
Synopsis:
There are five acts in the play. Each of the five acts is a repetition of the first act, and each is instigated by a different performer. In each act a further element is introduced by the first performer to enter in that act. Each new element is repeated in all subsequent acts.
- http://www.anthonyhowell.org/perf3.php
- http://www.anthonyhowell.org/perf3.php
Notes:
Going was performed first As An improvised piece - called Homage to Pietro Longhi. It was shown during Michael Craig-Martin's choice for the Serpentine Gallery in the summer of 1976. As Going - which employed the same structure but with entirely rehearsed Actions And A specific text - it was shown At The Paris Biennale in 1977 And subsequently At the Mickery Theatre in Amsterdam And the Theatre for the New City in New York Among many other venues.
1st Produced:
Serpentine Gallery, London 1976
Organisations:
-
1st Published:
- -
Music:
-
To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies
Booksellers:
Genre:
Performance Art
Parts:
Male: - Female: - Other: -
Further Reference:
-
Top of PageHomage to Morandi
Synopsis:
Homage to Morandi was created by The Theatre of Mistakes in 1979. The performers were Anthony Howell, Julian Maynard Smith and Peter Stickland. In the performance the metaphysics of Morandi's paintings of still lives is transferred to the scale of wardrobes, chairs and suitcases. These are moved through several furniture vignettes by the performers in Act 1. With each ensuing act these vignettes are repeated, with less and less furniture every time, the performers "standing in" for the furniture.
- http://www.anthonyhowell.org/perf4.php
- http://www.anthonyhowell.org/perf4.php
Notes:
-
1st Produced:
Saint Martins School of Art, London 1979
Organisations:
-
1st Published:
- -
Music:
-
To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies
Booksellers:
Genre:
Performance Art
Parts:
Male: 3 Female: - Other: -
Further Reference:
-
Top of PageOrpheus And Hermes
Synopsis:
-
Notes:
-
1st Produced:
- 1978
Organisations:
-
1st Published:
- -
Music:
-
To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies
Booksellers:
Genre:
Performance Art
Parts:
Male: - Female: - Other: -
Further Reference:
-
Top of PageStreet, The
Synopsis:
Drawing from "The Gymnasium" - a comprehensive collection of performance exercises devised by the company - a performance was created which required some nine weeks of rehearsal on the same London street - Ascham Street in Kentish Town. This performance featured a chorus of performers in the first floor windows, and any passerby walking up the pavement on the left would trigger closure of the windows - which in turn caused most the performers in the street to fall to the ground. A passerby walking up the pavement on the right would trigger the opening of the windows and the continuation of the chorus which in turn triggered the continuation of the performance. The chorus itself was created out of snippets of conversation overheard from the street below. These were repeated additively in instant, repetitive sonnet forms. The performance also featured the externalisation of residents' living rooms (their furniture including televisions placed on the pavements), an interior decorated skip, and slow motion children who followed a slow motion ice-cream van into the deepening twilight.
- http://www.anthonyhowell.org/perf1.php
- http://www.anthonyhowell.org/perf1.php
Notes:
devised by members of the company nucleus - Fiona Templeton, Michael Greenall And Patricia Murphy
1st Produced:
Ascham Street in Kentish Town, London 1975
Organisations:
-
1st Published:
- -
Music:
-
To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies
Booksellers:
Genre:
Performance Art
Parts:
Male: - Female: - Other: -
Further Reference:
-
Top of PageWaterfall, A
Synopsis:
There was a different performance for each day of this 48 day exhibition. The piece was originally based on a timing device for another performance. On day 1, a single performer sat cross-legged between two buckets with a cup in each hand. She scooped water out of the first pail into one cup, poured it into the other cup, then poured it out of the second cup into the second pail. Each action lasted for twenty counts - so transference of water took 60 seconds per cupful. There were sixty cups of water in the first pail - so to empty it took an hour. Her last action was to pour all the water in the second pail back into the first pail. On the second day a second performer was added as well as a chair and the second performer held the second bucket between his legs - now the last action of the first performer was to pour water from the second cup into the first cup of the second performer. Thus a pouring chain was established. On the third day a table was added and a third performer. By the twelth day there were twelve performers arranged vertically above each other on a structure made of tables balanced on chairs balanced on top of other tables. The synchronisation of arm-movements was achieved by the recitation of chants - known as "Koans" - and all these chants were based on weather reports from off-shore regions of the British Isles. Each day's performance culminated in the pouring of the water in the top bucket into the lower bucket, so at every stage the lower bucket had to be within range of the upper pouring position - this dictated the nature of the structure. After twelve days, the performer cross-legged on the ground was removed and the lower bucket raised onto the first chair - so by the twenty-fourth day there was again only one performer, this time sitting at the height of the completed structure with a bucket on either side of him. For the next twenty-four days, the entire sequence of performance was reversed, and so the structure was dismantled and the last day was a reflection of the first day.
- http://www.anthonyhowell.org/perf2.php
- http://www.anthonyhowell.org/perf2.php
Notes:
-
1st Produced:
Hayward Gallery, London 1977
Organisations:
-
1st Published:
- -
Music:
-
To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies
Booksellers:
Genre:
Performance Art
Parts:
Male: - Female: - Other: -
Further Reference:
-
Top of Page