Goodbye to Unscripted
6 Aug 2024
Regular readers of the newsletter will be familiar with Unscripted, a three-year project funded by National Lottery Heritage Fund. The project uses heritage as a tool to help foster integration and a greater understanding of Bristol between its newer and older inhabitants.
There have been copious features in this newsletter about the exciting work that’s been going on in the Bristol Old Vic Heritage team, spilling the tea on rowdy audiences of the past, giving you the inside scoop from Bristol Archives and sharing our heritage donations of the month, to name but a few. Well, those three years have flown by and Unscripted: A Performative History of Bristol, Bristolian’s and Bristol People will be coming to an end in September.
If this is the first time you’re hearing about Unscripted, you’re in for a treat...
Unscripted is a heritage project in partnership with the University of Bristol Theatre Collection and Bristol Archives. It has sought to make local heritage more accessible, stimulate conversations around belonging, identity and Bristol’s history, and celebrate historic connections between our theatre and the people of Bristol.
We’ve worked with communities across the city, exploring the 258-year history of Bristol Old Vic, asking them what stories they want to tell and how to tell them. This has challenged the way in which history is traditionally told, documented, owned and displayed. We’ve used wind machines with three-year-olds, chatted about great nights out with older adults and made our own iced tea syrup with women who have experience migration.
Working with such a broad range of Bristolians has meant working with lots of partners across the city, each with their own expertise, including local schools, Redcliffe and St Paul’s Nurseries, Brunel Care, ACH and many more.
Unscripted Celebration - You're invited!
If you’d like to see what we’ve all been up to and celebrate all that has been achieved, please come along to the Unscripted Celebration on Thursday 5 Sep, between 2pm – 6pm at Bristol Old Vic. This will be a free event to showcase Unscripted and all the work it has produced. It will include interactive installations, soundscapes and exhibitions throughout the building, allowing visitors to experience Bristol Old Vic through the eyes of Unscripted and find out what we have achieved in collaboration with communities in Bristol. In true Unscripted fashion, we welcome friends of Bristol Old Vic and those who might never have been here before. There will be something for everyone.
Find out more here
Take a look at Three Years of Unscripted Projects...
Community Choir (Jul '21 - Jul '24)
Bristol Old Vic's Community Choir started in September 2021 and was completely free. Growing to 60 members, they met every Monday in Bristol Old Vic covering a huge range of music genres and no audition necessary.
A Recipe for a Great Night Out - Exhibition (Oct '21 - Oct '22)
A Recipe For A Great Night Out was created in collaboration with our Made in Bristol group of young theatre makers, and staff and tenants at Brunelcare Colliers Gardens. It celebrated all the ingredients needed for a truly epic night at the theatre.
Homemade - Exhibition and Project
(May '22 - Sep '23)
Homemade was a project aimed at developing opportunity, experience, and skills for employment for clients of migrant support and integration organisation, ACH. Homemade used heritage as a tool to help foster integration and a greater understanding of Bristol between its newer and older inhabitants.
A temporary exhibition was co-curated with participants.
Family Days (ongoing)
Each Feb and Oct half term, and on our birthday in May, we host a free family day jam-packed with creative and hands-on activities for all the family with time and space to explore the historic theatre.
Read more about our work with young children here
Pushchair Tour (ongoing)
The Pushchair Tour is available throughout the year, providing a cross-venue offer for our littlest culture explorers.
Meet our actor Elephant and discover six special Bristol Places:
- Royal West of England Academy (RWA)
- St George’s Bristol
- Bristol Old Vic
- Bristol Beacon
- Brunel’s SS Great Britain
- M Shed
A Monumental Task - Exhibition and Project
(Dec '22 - Apr '23)
Seven Bristol schools (Bristol Brunel Academy, Bristol Metropolitan Academy, Cotham, Bristol Cathedral Choir, Bedminster Down and Oasis John Williams) participated in A Monumental Task (AMT).
AMT is a Theatre in Education project that engages young people and their wider communities in discussion around our shared colonial history.
Rep & Erasure (Feb '24 - Aug '24)
By digging into archival material, dating from the 1760s to the present day, the Rep & Erasure project was a creative exploration by young people using games, drama and digital storytelling to explore and share meaning.
A co-curated exhibition will be in the Pit Passageway from 5th September 2024.
Sewn Together - Exhibition and Project (Oct '23 - Feb '24)
Last winter the Heritage Team at Bristol Old Vic provided three work placements making costumes for The Roaring Girl. They met skilled sewers Susy, Tetyana and Munira through migrant support organisation ACH. Together they worked with designer Alice Sales to research and create historically inspired costumes.
Seen and Heard - Exhibition
Seen and Heard was an exhibition that honoured the contributions of young people over the last 150(ish) years to our stage. It paid tribute to our youngest stars and explored how attitudes towards them had changed over the last century and a half.
English & Drama classes (Jun '22 - Jun '24)
In partnership with accessible theatre specialists Spilt Ink, we ran a programme for adults from migrant and refugee communities to develop their English language skills through drama. The approach uniquely combined English-as-a-Second Language (ESL) with drama training which has helped participants develop their confidence and a strong sense of community within the group.
