special guests

Visit our website www.thespecialguests.co.uk . It was April. In truth it was halfway through April. The month that fools, fibbers and tricksters come out of the woodwork. Spring had sprung and as ever, The Special Guests arrived slightly off cue but with our confidence intact. We like to say we were forced to flee Edinburgh via fire escape in the dead of night, but ruffling a few feathers was always part of our game plan. It made our mothers anxious and our accountant despair. We crashed our truckload of trouble on the M4, magically covering oursleves in a blanket of self-raising flour. We walked away from the wreckage unhurt but things were never quite the same again. We rummaged through skips in salford looking for abandoned toilets. We haggled over the price of ill-fitting costumes. We'd prepared ourselves for dusty backs, smeared lipstick smiles and clammy palms. Tempers frayed and arguments were slept on. Sometimes it was difficult to tell where the playing ended and the truth began. We stole, lied, flirted, bluffed and then double-bluffed our way into the hearts of those who claimed not to have an interest in theatre. We then confessed, too aware that what goes around comes around. We got so good at pretending that we forgot how to stop. We want tragedy and comedy and everything in betweeen. We're keen to unsettle, agitate and delight, tentatively treading the boards between truth and fiction, pretence and authenticity. We aim to add insult to your injuries but rest easy on the eye. The tonic to your interval drinks. Around 8.30 we aim to give our audiences so little they leave, assuming it must be the interval. By 11.15 we pull out all the stops and get lost in the razzle-dazzle. We hope our audiences will take the bait. The Special Guests have been devising generous and playful live performance since 2002. Drawn to the themes of love, displacement, family ties and failure we muddy the waters between theatrical trickery and emotional authenticity. Work is made through discussion, research, improvisation and play. Working collaboratively and democratically, we aim to entertain and unsettle wide-reaching audiences with dark hearted humour. The company has toured nationally to theatre spaces, galleries and beyond, championing truth, flirting with disaster and hoping audiences will take the bait. I edited my profile with Thomas' Myspace Editor V4.4