Wondrous Wednesdays

Welcome to Wondrous Wednesdays, our blog dedicated to our new show Wondrous Stories!

Wondrous Stories is an extraordinary large-scale production that will be the opening show of the Birmingham 2022 Festival! We will be transforming Centenary Square in Birmingham into the stage for the show from the 17 – 20 March 2022.

Wondrous Wednesdays will follow the journey of Wondrous Stories, as we document the creation and evolution of this spectacular show! You will get to see some behind-the-scenes action and get an insight into how we make our famous large-scale productions. 

The show launches the six-month festival shining a global spotlight on creativity in the West Midlands that will sit alongside the Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games.  

On the 2nd and 3rd October 2021, we got together with all of our collaborators for the show in our creation space at the Town Hall in Leamington Spa for a creative ‘kick off’ meeting.  

Our Artistic Director Kevin Finnan and Associate Choreographers for the show, Jamaal Burkmar and Sonia Sabri worked with the Motionhouse dancers to begin creating the movement language for the key character groups in the show. These methods will then be shared with Critical Mass, an inclusive dance collective of up to 300 young people that will be performing in Wondrous Stories.

Our Guest Performers Freewheelin Dance and their community groups also got underway with their work on the project over the weekend. We are very much looking forward to working with them!

Check out the video below to see a short clip of the dancers in rehearsal during Jamaal’s workshop. They used a short musical phrase as inspiration and worked together to ‘play’ and improvise movements as a group.

We can’t wait to watch the show develop over the next few months and look forward to sharing the process with you all! Watch this space!