by Sherwin Altarez Mapanoo

Since 1991, Stan’s Cafe has been devising, staging, and touring experimental theatrical and paratheatrical works, not only from its base in Birmingham, but in different parts of the world. At present, the company’s office is located in AE Harris, a metal works factory turned into a performance and rehearsal space, in the Jewellery Quarter. Audience reception to the venue, first used for their production, Of All The People In All The World, has convinced the company to remain. In 2010, it has secured a Grants For The Arts Lottery Award to stay in AE Harris, and since then, the warehouse venue has played host to a number of rehearsals, workshops and performances by Stan’s Café and other theatre companies as well.

On a personal note, the venue was remarkable. When I visited their office for the first time, Charlotte Martin, Stan’s Café’s general manager, toured me around the venue, which consists of four main spaces that are accessible into one other. I was quite amazed at how the company transformed the vacated portions of a metal factory into a range of performance and rehearsal spaces. Three spaces open into the courtyard from which a fifth space can be accessed. The company named these spaces after continents, Africa, The Americas, Europe, Asia, and Australia, which is only appropriate as a legacy to the “Rice Show” that was first staged in the venue before it went touring in different countries around the world.

On Archival Research and Writing

Through this project, I was able to implement my writing skills and existing knowledge of archival research as a methodology into practice, while confronting the challenges of history writing based on the archives. Being an “outsider” who never collaborated with the company nor watched any of their productions before, it was somewhat challenging to write the company's history as “full” and “accurate” as possible in a short period of time. So in order to address this difficulty, a considerable amount time of my placement was allotted to both research and reading.

At the outset I took time to browse through and read the webpages and blog entries of the company’s official website (www.stanscafe.co.uk) in order to familiarize myself with their production history, repertoire (theatrical, para-theatrical/site-specific, touring), education works and other miscellaneous projects. As advised by James, I also spent time looking at the company’s own compilation of newspaper and magazine clippings, programmes, catalogues, and a number of journals and books in which the works of Stan’s Café are mentioned. The resources that I got from their website and documentation were supplemented by my own online research, which I compiled and arranged in different categories and word files – news, press releases, blog entries, and reviews, while also noting the pertinent bibliographic information which are then utilized to expand the citations of the Wiki page.

In an attempt to have an accurate and expanded account of the company’s history, I utilized as much available resources as possible to expand the texts and citations. I had to embark on the research of related literature and treat the task just like an academic research project. The main methodology that I did was having conversations with James, who acted as my primary source. Gathering secondary sources were also done as another means of knowing more about the company. This methodology was facilitated with the use of a range of archival materials, including published articles, news, books, journals, etc.

Upon completion of my initial research and review of the existing Wikipedia entry, I met with James and presented him my recommendations for the page. I came up with a number of categories that I found relevant, which he later revised for development. To facilitate my writing process, James outlined a chronological chart of the company’s productions over the years, categorizing them as either theatrical, para-theatrical, or touring projects. I was guided by this chart throughout the course of writing the Wikipedia page.

On the Role of Documentation and Archive

One could argue that there’s no such theatre group that does not express interest in preserving its own documentation, and I find it interesting the degree of attention that Stan’s Cafe gives to the archives and cataloguing its own works. Hence, if there’s one thing that I learned while doing my research for this project, it is perhaps the important role that documentation plays for the theatre company. I could only speculate about what their exact intentions are, but I think that this topic raises a number of issues about the function and the role of the archive in theatre and performance. Does it bring credibility? Is it aimed at marketing or promoting? Does it serve as a report? Or a record of history and memory? Or is it merely for posterity? Why create a Wikipedia page, in the first place? I guess, it could be an amalgamation of these motives.

As I observed it, Stan’s Café is a group that takes archiving and documentation seriously, and every theatre company, in my opinion, should do the same. I couldn’t agree more that the requirement for documentation, as what James stresses, can be particularly helpful when dealing with “promoters, curators, and folk” who can give opportunities to get their theatre work out there. The company also makes use of the internet both as an archive and a platform for communication, presence and promotion, which is clearly a good strategy. The company’s official website is an archive in itself. In fact, a bulk of information that I referenced in writing the Wikipedia entry came from the website. Their online diary, which they update with texts, photos, and videos on a regular basis, is also extremely helpful.

On the Practice of Collaboration

As an intern at Stan’s Café, I was also acquainted with the structure of the theatre company and the rationale for adopting such a structure, while researching and working on the Wikipedia. Basically, the company is a group of artists coming from different disciplines, under the artistic direction of James. Since the very beginning, Stan’s Café has always been open to outside collaborators and associate artists from a wide variety of backgrounds.

This openness for collaboration is one attribute that I admire about Stan’s Cafe for a number of reasons. For one thing, collaboration can be fruitful for it allows a company not only to branch out, but to build relationships with other artists as well. Being open for collaboration has eventually broadened the company’s base and developed strong connections with venues, individuals, and companies across the United Kingdom and other parts of the world.

For Stan’s Café, collaboration is a valuable component in the creative process. Indeed, interesting works can be created when artists collaborate – both with one another, and with people who don’t necessarily come from the background of theatre. And this is exactly what Stan’s Café has been doing over the years. Although they mostly work with performers and devisers, they also collaborate with other individuals such as sound artists, composers, photographers, visual artists, sculptors and filmmakers. Depending on the production being worked upon, the lineup changes from time to time. The company has learned to collaborate with a diverse group of people and operate in a dynamic environment, specifically on staging site-specific works and touring projects.

Stan’s Café’s practice of devising theatre works through collaboration has led me to interrogate a number of questions regarding authorship, creative process, and challenges inherent in collaborative, experimental theatre-making. What stakes of authorship, for instance, can be applied in a collaborative context? How is devised work written? What is the applicable paradigm/model for curating or directing collaborative theatre practices? These are some preliminary questions that I have in mind when I think about collaboration in theatre. I haven’t done any research on this topic and I would like to explore this in the future.

It is also worth mentioning that, in terms of practice, the company doesn’t limit itself as a theatre group, but rather constantly creates works exploring the hybridity and inter-disciplinarity in performance. Stan’s Café produces theatre, radio, films, installations, durational, site specific works and historical revivals without altering its category as a theatre company, perhaps in an attempt to reach, excite, and engage with new audiences. Their paratheatrical performances, in particular, largely problematize the theatrical use of space and allow spaces to be explored and understood in a variety of ways. Likewise, the company often interrogates the relationship between a piece of installation or performance and the audience, while veering away from the traditional paradigm of art/spectator interaction generated from typical theatre architecture. This artistic approach is evident in many of Stan’s Café’s site-specific, experimental pieces.

On Theatre and Education

Another valuable lesson that I acquired while working with Stan’s Café is the efficacy of integrating education with theatrical projects that deal with engaging, socially relevant themes. This is an initiative that the company is really passionate about. Part of their legacy is collaborating with students and working in a variety of educational settings, ranging from running film-making classes, devising theatre shows for kids, to staging large-scale theatre productions with university students. They also conduct workshops and lectures for both students and teachers in support of their theatre shows, as a form of engagement in which creative ideas are explored and devised collaboratively.

Stan’s Café’s education initiatives are often in constant dialogue with the rest of their repertoire. For instance, Stan’s Café saw the educational potential of the “Rice Show” so they decided to develop a community/education version of the piece, which they called Plague Nation. In this project, they incorporated statistics that would illustrate a range of ideas to young students, and which were relevant to the communities in which they lived. This education work was toured to schools across the United Kingdom.

What I find remarkable here is how these two strands – theatre and education – can inform one other and often combine.

On the Issue of Funding

The issue of funding is another topic that is worth discussing in this placement report. Working with Stan’s Café has not only taught me of effective ways of expanding its base, but also of the need for being resourceful and creative, especially at times of crisis. In one of my conversations with James, he told me how Stan’s Cafe progressed from its early beginnings as a partnership between him and Graeme Rose and that they first did rehearsals in a spare room of a rented house, and for a time, even became resident on the top floor of an abandoned factory building due to insufficient funding. It was not until 2002 when the company got its first revenue funding from Arts Council England.

The current economic landscape, one way or another, affects Stan’s Café and its funding considerably. As a matter of fact, their funding agreement from Arts Council England has been amended and they will receive 1% cut in funding next year, and 2% the year after. It is a known fact that as the British government cuts expenses, culture and the arts are among the first to face reductions in the already limited funding. With these budget cuts in government, other sources of support have become critical to Stan’s Café’s financial health, and this is something that the company has learned to deal with over the years.

There is no denying that devising a production amidst budget cuts can be challenging. However, sufficient funding isn’t everything for a theatre company to survive. Take for instance the case of Stan’s Café’s innovative project, Of All The People In All The World. I was amazed with the fact that it was initially mounted through a measly £700 funding, which the company used to buy a tonne of rice. The “Rice Show” would eventually become very successful internationally, open doors for touring opportunities, and generate a great deal of grants and income for the company. In their production, Just Price of Flowers, the company used the set and costumes recycled from The Cleansing of Constance Brown. What I’d like to point out here is that creativity and resourcefulness precede funding. Such a big cliché but true.


Conclusion

In the end, I did enjoy my experience working with the company, even though I felt, to some extent, that I wasn’t used to my full potential. Given the opportunity, I would have liked to do some other tasks such as getting involved in some practical and technical aspects of their production. However, I fully understand that three months was not enough time for me to integrate myself in their work process, and they were too busy rehearsing for their production, The Anatomy of Melancholy.

Nevertheless, it was a pleasure working with James who constantly kept in contact with me to answer my questions and make sure that I write the entry as accurate as possible. Through a combination of research methodologies and meetings with James, I eventually got a grip of the company’s production history, structure, repertoire, and how it has run for the past two decades.

As a whole, the work that I have done for the company has been a good experience. I am grateful to have had this opportunity. Stan’s Café is such an interesting theatre company that complicates the definition of theatre through the use of multi-disciplinal, inter-disciplinal, and hybrid sources.

Stan’s Café is my cup of tea.