The beginning...

So, about a year and a half ago I was sitting on my sofa on a blustery day, wrapped up warm and drinking a cup of tea, and I had this idea - Why don't I go and train full time at a circus school?  Wouldn't that be great?  Wouldn't it be fun!  Wouldn't it make me so much more employable as an actor?!  NO!, said the voice in my head.  It would hurt, be very expensive and is a very silly idea.  Sensible advice.  However, from that point on the seed of the idea began to grow, and bit by bit started to feel like it might actually have something in it.  I could use the new skills not only as a performer, but as a theatre maker and movement director, specialising in the dramatic integration of circus into narrative theatre.  I asked for advice from other theatre makers who seemed genuinely enthused by concept, and so set about finding out how to make it reality.

And so here I am, nineteen months later and absolutely terrified.  I have auditioned and been accepted into Circomedia in Bristol, one of the only circus schools in the UK, where the emphasis of the training is on creativity, devising and new approaches to circus.  The lovely Arts Council have agreed to support me and everything is in place for the first day on Monday.  Monday! Oh. My. God.

The purpose of this blog is to allow the training that I'll be undertaking to be shared, to create interest and ultimately to raise the profile of the use of circus arts in theatre.  I'm a Nottingham based actress and intend to remain so, meaning that any learning in Bristol will be brought back to the East Midlands at the end of the training, and then... who knows?  Any ideas?  Any at all?

So please watch this space and join me on this wonderful technicolour journey into the world of contemporary circus.  It's going to be exciting, scary, thrilling, nervewracking and most certainly painful.  Arnica cream at the ready everyone.