The DTK team have been handed the Offie/Off Fest/Off West End Award for our July production of On Me on the Greater Manchester Fringe!
We were also shortlisted for the Greater Manchester Fringe Award for Best Drama and playwright Caroline Lamb was shortlisted for the Write for the Stage Award for New Writing!
Find out more about the event right here!
Dangerous To Know’s run of On Me on the Greater Manchester Fringe ended on 30th July. We had a great critical reception (more on that later) and superb audience responses – and, at the time of writing, we are awaiting the results of an Off West End award nomination for best short run.
What better memento for such a fantastic project than a selection of gorgeous photographs of the show’s dress run, taken by talented and prolific arts photographer Shay Rowan? Take a look below for the fantastic images, captured at The Seven Oaks in Manchester.
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Just days after finishing our run on the Greater Manchester Fringe, we’re thrilled to announced that On Me has been nominated for an OffFest – or Off West End – award for Best Short Run!
We’ll find out the results of this nomination at the Greater Manchester Fringe Awards, which are taking place on the 7th August.
Wish us luck!
Rehearsals are well underway for our upcoming production of On Me on the Greater Manchester Fringe!
The piece will be playing at the Seven Oaks – an antique boozer on the edge of Manchester’s China Town – in the venue’s transformed upstairs space from 27th – 30th July as part of the Greater Manchester Fringe festival.
You can book tickets for the event right here.
This vital new piece of theatre tackles themes of sexual assault, gender-based violence and female safety, following Shona and Christian – two actors performing troubling scenes for a true crime documentary series. As the pair develop an undeniable attraction to one other, unsavoury questions hang unanswered in the air.
Directed by Helen Parry, On Me focuses on the challenges of being a role model, ally, spontaneous romantic and potential victim all at once when chasing love in the post #metoo era.
Due to its challenging themes, the piece comes with 15+ age guidance and a content warning for sexual assault/r*pe, domestic violence, stalking and murder.
The run will include a matinee on Wednesday 27th July at 3pm and a BSL interpreted performance on the evening of Thursday 28th July. Evening performances will all begin at 7.30pm.
Tickets are available via https://manchester.ssboxoffice.com/events/on-me
We did it!! Thank you so much to everyone who donated to our Kickstarter or shared the link to help us reach our target.
On Me will be playing at the Seven Oaks pub theatre in Manchester city centre between 27th and 30th July this year, with one BSL interpreted performance.
You can book tickets via the Greater Manchester Fringe by visiting https://manchester.ssboxoffice.com/events/on-me.
To learn more about the project as it goes ahead, and/or to keep up to date with the activities of theatre company Dangerous To Know, please follow @dtkmanc on Twitter/Instagram and http://www.facebook.com/DangerousToKnow.
We’re now in the last 20 days of our crowdfunder – and we need help to get over the finish line in time! https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/onme/on-me
This campaign will support the upcoming production of “On Me”: a brand new play that tackles gender based violence, sexual violence and femicide, with the action taking place on the set of a true crime documentary. The funds we raise will feed into the “match funding” for our Arts Council bid, enabling us to pay a set wage to our creative team. If we don’t hit our target, we get nothing at all.
The play is coming to the Greater Manchester Fringe this July (2022), and will be performed at The Seven Oaks on Nicholas Street from 27th – 30th July.
Every little helps – if you can give just £1, you’ll be supporting an independent theatre company and enabling us to hire creatives looking for North West UK theatre jobs in what could be a major stepping stone in their career. You’ll also help us to make a powerful contribution to the urgent fight against #GBV. We have some great rewards too, so you’ll get something in return for your contribution!
If you can’t donate, please share information about this campaign wherever you can.
After an impressively long hiatus, we are BACK with a challenging new project. This July, we plan to present On Me at the Greater Manchester Fringe.
This is a vital new play tackling the issue of gender-based violence from a fresh and striking perspective – taking place on a true crime film set!
In order to stage this work, we need your help. GBV will not go away on its own, and we hope On Me will prompt real action and change. To achieve this, we need to pay our cast and creative team. It’s something we strongly believe in.
To support our Arts Council England funding bid, we must independently raise £1,200 by 18/05/2022. For this purpose, we have just launched a Kickstarter. Find it right here.
It offers some great rewards, from a personalised poem to a free place at a writing workshop – where you can create your own creative campaign for societal change – to a one-to-one creative consultation! If you can, and ONLY if you can, please pledge to support this unique and urgent work.
The issue of gender-based violence continues to be a major societal concern. With constant evidence of its urgency visible not only in the media but also in the lived experiences of virtually every woman, On Me has never been more relevant.
We believe On Me will further the conversation surrounding gender-based violence in a way that provokes real action and encourages changes in behaviour and outlook within audiences. We need to raise our target of at least £1200 within the next 60 days in order to produce this work and pay its cast and creative team fairly.
The piece will be shown at the Seven Oaks on Nicholas Street in Central Manchester from 27th July to 30th July with a BSL interpreted performance on 28th July. Check out the Greater Manchester Fringe website for booking updates!
Here’s a lovely video summary of our experience delivering “Theft of a Girl” – a multimedia monologue about the scandalous kidnapping of teenager Ellen Turner from Pott Shrigley in 1826, penned by DTK artistic director Caroline Lamb.
The piece was performed in the nursery at Lyme Park in Disley, Cheshire, as one of the National Trust’s “Live at Lyme” events in September 2017. “Live at Lyme” was developed as a result of the “Trust New Art” programming scheme. Elka Lee Green played Ellen sensitively and soulfully, while a stop-motion video – beautifully shot and edited by Morag Hickman – played alongside her. Director Helen Parry lent her ample skills to the delicate moulding of the piece and performance.
This video was created by Jason Lock Photography 2017, and the whole process was generously supported by National Trust, Waterside Arts Centre & Creative Industries Trafford.
They say there’s no rest for the wicked. We’re still not sure of the crimes Caroline Lamb, Elka Lee Green and Helen Parry have committed, but only a couple of days after zipping back down the motorway following our production of Shirley in the Yorkshire Dales, they were setting to work on another intense project! Luckily for them, it was a pretty fantastic one.
The seeds were sown for Theft of a Girl a few months back, when we were awarded a commission from Creative Industries Trafford, who had struck up a partnership with the National Trust‘s exciting new venture known as “Trust New Art” – a branch of the charity that forms bridges between independent artists and National Trust places. Their upcoming project was Live at Lyme, and they were looking for artists and performers to create pieces inspired by the Regency period that would be shown around the beautiful and expansive Lyme Park estate in Cheshire – and within the walls of the grand house that presides over its grounds – throughout September.
The story of Ellen Turner – a schoolgirl from a wealthy family who was kidnapped and duped into marrying a much older man under false pretences – immediately sprung out at writer Caroline, and she composed a simple, atmospheric monologue to be performed in the nursery of the house, accompanied by a stop motion video. Once the commission was secured, Caroline and filmmaker Morag Hickman set out to Lyme Park armed with thirteen-inch artists’ mannequins painted in matte black and adorned with a variety of hats, and a delicate poseable doll in regency dress to painstakingly craft a film over two days.
The film completed and beautifully edited by Morag (who incidentally makes stunning jewellery too!), the project was put on hold while we staged Shirley. Caroline, Elka and Helen then regrouped to prepare the monologue.
On the weekend of the performances, the weather was beautiful and the trip to lovely Disley by train was swift. Lyme Park looked regal in the morning light, but we had little chance to wander around – Elka was straight into costume, and we hurried to the nursery for the first performance at 11.30am. Three more performances followed that day, and four the next. The room was packed, with audience members huddling up on the little iron-framed bed and clustering around the fireplace at the back. There was a hushed buzz in the nursery, which was thrilling.
We experience lovely feedback, and truly enjoyed our experience with Creative Industries Trafford and the National Trust. If “Trust New Art” can afford creatives like us the opportunity to work in places steeped in such rich and intriguing history as Lyme, and continue to introduce new audiences to theatre and art, then we hope the scheme goes on for many years!
Dangerous To Know 