Claudia Jefferies

Future Proof is a performance lecture, ritual and monologue developed for Plymouth Fringe online 2020.

It addresses our relationship to and anxieties around the past, present and – in this particularly strange year – future. Drawing on personal experiences with OCD, the piece looks at how we ritualise and fictionalise our lives and the disctinctions between chaos, order and Disorder.

Future proof was streamed live on August 5th 2020 and will remain available to watch online via link below until August 19th 2020.

Future Proof is intended for further development across multiple media.

In response to the current pandemic and it’s inevitable impact on live theatre, I have  produced the following short film using text from Stranger Danger.

Stranger Danger is a new piece of work that examines the way we treat unknown people on a cultural and personal level. It asks what it is that drives people to unite over common (perceived) enemies to the point where we end up with organisations like the EDL and how the psychology of individualism feeds into modern day, Western tribalism. It will examine the various ways prejudice is transmitted as well as exploring the loneliness epidemic, Empathy Fatigue and the threat of the sentient robot or alien in sci-fi. It will comment on the psychology of borders, xenophobia and elitism, presenting and dissecting grotesque stereotypes of ‘self-made’ men and aggressive racist nationalists (among others).  

When finished,  it will take the form of a play-length piece of poetic verse that will be sung, spoken and punctuated with choreographed movement.  It will have an aesthetic that is somewhere between Punk and Cabaret Voltaire, with Dadaist masks and costumes.

The intention is to develop the work so that it can be delivered both as a solo piece and as an ensemble, with a group of dancers / speakers who move in unison and punctuate the text throughout. 

Stranger Danger will be developed in February 2019 during an Artist’s residency with Theatre Delicatessen as part of FemFest 2019 with a Scratch performance to be held on 02/03/2019. 

PURCHASE TICKETS HERE 

More dates to follow.

• 25/01/18 – Camden People’s Theatre (London) as part of Calm Down Dear Festival of Feminist Performance.  Tickets on sale now.  
• 07&08/02/18 – The Bike Shed Theatre (Exeter) as part of Calm Down Dear Exeter Tickets on sale now
• 08/03/18 – Tom Thumb Theatre, Margate as part of POW! (Power Of Women Festival) Thanet 2018 PLUS post-show discussion chaired by Journalist and Feminist Activist Rachel Bell .  Tickets on sale now

Filmed and edited by Rosie Powell

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️”…a visceral takedown of sexist social mores.” Read full review here 

Syd&Sylvia  will be at Edinburgh Festival Fringe this year.  Dates: 5-7, 9-14, 16-21 & 23-26 August.  Venue: Silk (Free Fringe venue 444), 28a King’s Stables Rd, Edinburgh EH1 2JY. See EdFringe website for more info. Please note ed fringe website lists different dates. Dates displayed here are the correct ones. 

London preview date:    *****ONE NIGHT ONLY*****   

Friday 14th July.  Hackney Showroom, Hackney Downs Studios, Amhurst Terrace, E8 2BT.

Tickets: £8

Book online or telephone 020 3095 9747

Filmed 06/12/16 by Katy Jalili. Edited by Paul Asher Frankl. 

“This show is a face-punch right in the patriarchy…brutal, honest, uncompromising and urgent… one of the best pieces I’ve seen this year. Everyone should have a chance to see it” – Jen Smethurst, SPILL National Platform Project Manager & General Manager, Sh!t Theatre

Syd and Sylvia  will be performed on Tuesday 06/12/16 at Carnesky’s Finishing School, Soho as part of a double bill with live artist Jo Hauge 

6-12 Manette Street, London W1D 4AT.  Doors open at 7pm for an 8pm start.

Tickets £5 in advance or On The Door

The year is 1987. Infamous club owner and compere Syd and his long-suffering wife, club singer and entertainer Sylvia, have been performing the same old routines at their Eastbourne working men’s club for 15 years. However, since taking up an evening class in Women’s Studies, Sylvia has been taking liberties with some of the material, much to the disapproval of her abusive husband…

Syd and Sylvia is a one-woman show about control, expectation and the crap that women face every day, told through gender bending, karaoke and bad jokes.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Previous audience feedback:

“…violent and harrowing and kind of raw. If we’re talking brush strokes, it isn’t light watercolours. It’s clay. It’s painting with a hammer. And I really, really love that.”

“Brave, funny, unlike anything I’ve ever seen”

“…Mighty Boosh with a strong moral compass”

Syd will be performed at Carnesky’s Finishing School ‘s pop-up venue in Soho on Tuesday 25th October as part of CFS’s Alumni shows programme, which runs on Tuesdays until the end of the year.  

Venue address: 

(Old) Foyle’s basement, 6-12 Manette Street, London W1D 4AT. Doors 7pm for an 8pm start. Tickets are £5 in advance, £8 OTD