Royal Ballet's Kate Flatt brings soulful dance to Watford Palace Theatre (From Watford Observer)

Royal Ballet's Kate Flatt brings soulful dance to Watford Palace Theatre

2:53pm Monday 8th March 2010 in

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Who cares for the carers is the subtext of Soul Play, a community-led dance performance taking place at Watford Palace Theatre next week.

Leading choreographer Kate Flatt is a creative associate at the Palace. She spent time with carers and bereavement counsellors at the Peace Hospice while working on the concept for the show, which questions what the soul really is and where it lies.

Kate was struck by how similar the caring role of the hospice staff was to what she was trying to achieve in her work.

“Spending two weeks at the hospice in Watford was closer to choreography than anything I’ve done before. It was an inspiring time, working with staff who are caring for people that only have a short time to live.

Spending two weeks at the Peace Hospice in Watford was closer to choreography than anything I’ve done before

Kate Flatt

“We’re both dealing with deep emotion but whereas we are dealing with the fiction, they are dealing with genuine things that occur when loss happens and the reality of a terminal existence.”

Both funny and tender, Soul Play recounts a man’s journey, following his mysterious, untimely death.

Dancer Joy Constantinides joins actor Sam Curtis on stage in this cross-over performance between abstract dance and theatre. The script is by St Albans writer Anna Reynolds (award-winning Jordan, Skin Hunger and Push! an opera about childbirth) and the show is designed by Kate’s daughter Chloe Lamford, a former Rickmansworth School pupil who previously worked on Trestle Theatre Company’s Lola.

Kate, who devised and directs the show, has lived in Watford since 1992 and trained at the Royal Ballet School. Past work as choreographer and movement director includes Les Miserables (West End), Turandot (Royal Opera House), Dr Faustus and Skellig (Young Vic) and Peter Grimes (winner of the South Bank Award 2006), she has also worked on films such as Chaplin, Restoration, and The Avengers.

As well as the production itself, Kate is looking forward to movement workshops with the Peace Hospice staff and the post show Q&As.

“There’s a lot of emotional content in the piece that lands on an audience and it’s the responsibility of reflective theatre to ponder what has occured.

“You can rationalise it away, but I don’t think you can get away from mystery of death. Soul Play is a discussion of death through the vitality of dance.”

Performances are suitable for over-14s and take place at Watford Palace Theatre on Wednesday, March 10 and Thursday, March 11 at 8pm. Details: 01923 225671