Youltide

Our narrator is trying to change the ending. Misery keeps interrupting. A lasagne is on the table. Why don't you come to dinner? It’s Christmas Eve, and the story starts again. 

Stage Whisper Productions is proud to present Youltide, a new original production by a group of studying theatre practitioners at Te Herenga Waka, Victoria University, alongside their collaborators. 

This December, join us at BATS theatre for a tragicomic Christmas play about gods, grief, storytelling, and the stories we just can’t seem to let go. 

Don't get left on the Naughty list. Donate to us, if you can. x

Our team includes queer, Māori, disabled, and Pākehā artists exploring how theatre can hold complicated emotions and offer new models for storytelling. 

We have three creative leads spearheading this show for their theatre MFAs: Teddy O’Neill’s script for Youltide draws on pūrākau, non-Western tragic form, and lived experience to ask: what does it mean to keep telling a story that always ends the same way? Director Joshua Lees is asking how to direct grief in new, fresh, exciting and still safe ways, and finally our stage manager, Will McMorran’s research focuses on supportive and respectful rehearsal spaces, and the ways that stage managers can create toolkits to manage these spaces.

Our crew are an innovative group of designers and scenographers who are taking classic Christmas to new levels, and our cast is an extremely talented troupe that is pushing our script to new heights. We work collaboratively and collectively, and we have all worked extremely hard to pull this show together into something wonderful.

Our crew consist of: 

Teddy O’Neill - Playwright/Marketing
William McMorran - Stage Manager/Sound Design
Joshua Lees - Director
Brie Keatley - Production Manager
Micah Nicholson - Assistant Director
Jessie - Sound Design & Operation
Ethan Cranefield - Lighting Design & Operation
Callie Cherrie-Thompkins - Costume and Makeup Design
Sam Hearps - Set Design and Construction
 

And our cast: 

Noah Kaio 
Ryan Cleland
Pan Clark
With special guest Jamie Honey.

Where is your koha going?

The money raised through this Boosted will go directly toward paying our cast and crew, covering design and accessibility costs, and helping us bring this strange, beautiful little show to life. We are an emerging group of artists, and your support makes a massive difference; not just to this production, but to the future of bold, collaborative theatre in Aotearoa. 

Paying our artists and collaborators fairly is a huge part of our company's ethos, and this fundraiser will help us to do that. We're also an extremely diverse group of people, and creating accessible theatre for people from all walks of life is extremely important to us.

Good to knows! 

• Boosted is an "all or nothing" platform. That means, if we don't reach our target, we won't receive any funds donated.
• Boosted takes a 10% fee of our crowdsourcing funds.
• We make no box office revenue from this show, meaning we're relying on you to help pay our cast and crew fairly.

• You can claim 33% tax back on your donations

  
  Every donation, big or small, counts! Sharing our campaign with your friends and whānau helps! Thank you for anything you may donate. x  

Grief, memory, and myth collide on Christmas Eve as Douglas, our narrator, refuses to let go of someone he loved. When his tale is interrupted by Gabe (and by a presence much older and darker than either of them), Douglas must confront the limits of stories, love, and time itself. Why don't you come to his living room and hear the tale for yourself?

Written by emerging playwright Teddy O'Neill, Youltide is a Christmas tragedy, with bits and pieces that will be loved by everyone, which includes you, Christmas haters! Premiering in the Dome at BATS Theatre from the 3rd to the 6th of December, Youltide is absurd, emotional, and a little bit festive. It's a play about the weight of memory, the rituals of mourning, and the pressure to be cheerful during the loneliest time of year. 

Youltide's script was developed as Teddy realised that Western narrative forms didn't often reflect the grieving processes of non-Western people - particularly Māori. His research, and alongside it this script,  progressed quickly after that, when he decided to take tikanga and translate it into a story about grief that reflects both a narrative an audience can follow, and the communal, familial efforts towards grieving that are stitched into the fabric of Māoritanga.

Our rehearsal room is shaped by our Director, Josh's, and our Stage Manager Will's research. The necessity for creating spaces that are accessible and respectful to explore topics like grief and death for all cast and crew involved, while also being supportive and consent-based are major areas of their research, which we believe is important for all theatremaking.

We're hoping that the impact of this show will be plentiful. Both in the way that we, if not others too, create theatre, but also in the way that our audiences will react to grief and death - and to each other. If this sounds like practice you'd want to see put into place, we'd appreciate any amount of koha you'd like to give us.

Ngā mihi nui.