In the first week of December – all thanks to Theatre Alive! – I was able to run a four day workshop with twelve actors and singers, culminating in an R&D showing at Kalamata Library.

The jumping off point for the project was Bears and Lawyers, a short story by Shaun Tan where bears take humans to court for their crimes against nature.

The way I go about immersing the actor in the animal is through a process called Transformation and Imaginative Improvisation. This process doesn’t anthropomorphise the animal, or project human attitudes onto them. Rather, by actors focusing on doing the activities that bears do (studied from close observation), human-like stories naturally emerge. A human-as-bear, fully active with her head in a book or nose upturned to the sky, will create stories for the audience that are simultaneously fully animal and fully human.

The Bear Project is gathering momentum, with Bears now stationed in the UK, Greece, Italy, France, Finland, Zimbabwe, and North America. We are already working on plans for future events. Keep your eyes peeled – I’ll keep you posted.

Bears in Libraries. Image by Jamie Bell