Catherine Boot
Circus | Physical Theatre | Outdoor Arts.
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'Me, Mother', part of Circus Fest at the Roundhouse - April 2016

What’s more frightening: catapulting yourself through the air and testing your physical limits night after night as a circus performer – or motherhood?

Following her biggest adventure to date - becoming a mother at the beginning of 2015 - Catherine worked as Assistant Director and Co-Devisor on 'Me, Mother', a world premiere form MESPLease that explores what happens when some of the country’s strongest and fittest women navigate the trials and joys of becoming a mother. When your whole career is based on your body’s ability to do seemingly impossible things, can you ever be the same again after giving birth?
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Catherine assisted Matilda Leyser, Associate Director of Improbable Theatre.  The show was created using Open Space Technology throughout rehearsals, in collaboration with performers Charlotte Mooney, Tina Koch, Grania Pickard and Linn Broden.

Read the reviews here.

This show marks the beginning of an unfolding international conversation on the subject of motherhood.  The ambition is to take this show structure around the world, with an evolving cast of women, at different stages through their mothering journey.  Stay tuned for where we may be headed to next.

 'A Small Chance of Showers', Can't Sit Still - 2014

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It’s raining, it’s pouring, and it hasn’t stopped for months, maybe even years.  People all over the country are leaving their flooded homes in the search for higher ground.  But Lil and Dylan are bored of walking, and so instead invite you to share in their tales of boats, goldfish and how to cure a girl whose tears have turned to glass.

Using a mixture of clowning, physical theatre, circus, puppetry, and quite a few buckets of water, Can’t Sit Still take you on a journey of rain and storms, weather reports and wellies to tell a true story of the future (which we might have made up).
Playfully engaging with big themes of global warming and child refugees, A Small Chance of Showers aimed to create a space for conversation between children and adults about these issues.  You can see a video of the rehearsal process here.

A Small Chance of Showers was Can't Sit Still's first full length outdoor show, which toured to street theatre and children's festivals in summer 2014.

Hubbub Theatre Company - 2012 & 2014

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Hubbub Theatre Company was created by Artistic Director Jen Sumner in 2012 to develop the talents of East Midlands based learning disabled and able artists, emerging and established professionals.  The company creates original and innovative theatre, alongside classes, workshops and a theatrical club night. Catherine works as Circus Facilitator and Assistant Director with Hubbub.

Hubbub's shows to date have included the street show 'Village Green Antics', commissioned for Derby City's Paralympic closing celebrations, and 'Kessoku: Tales of Togetherness', which premiered at Deda in November 2014, before setting off on regional tour in Spring 2015.


New Street Theatre and Lakeside Arts Centre - 2012 & 2013

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New Street Theatre Company, under the direction of Martin Berry, have been collaborating with Lakeside Arts Centre in Nottingham for over 5 years, to create bold and inventive interpretations of classic stories, using large community casts of performers with a professional creative team.  In 2012 Catherine was puppetry director for Little Shop of Horrors, working with the giant Audrey 2 plant, and in 2013 returned as movement director on Sweeney Todd, working on character physicality, and choreographing the ensemble, including a death drop from a 2m platform and many neck slashings.


Zygote Festival, Sleaford - 2013

In 2013, Can't Sit Still were commissioned by ArtsNK to create a bespoke outdoor aerial performance for the Zygote Festival in Sleaford.
A unique feature of this commission was the engagement of the community in its creation - a local secondary school worked with professional designer Helen Fownes-Davies to design and make the 'pod', an integral structure in the creation of the piece's narrative.  Primary schools pupils were also taught to make a miniature lantern version of the pod, to light their way around the Festival sites.

Here Come the Brides, Lost & Found Festival  - 2012

Stumble across something surprising on your way to work. Be inspired by chance encounters. Allow your view of the city to be altered. Unearth art in a scruffy looking box labelled ‘lost & found’.
In September 2012 Here Come the Brides was one of 11 pieces of new work by emerging artists, selected from nearly 300 applications, to perform at Lost & Found, a festival of pop-up performance which takes place in unexpected locations throughout Manchester City Centre.  Using a blend of walkabout street theatre, fused with a giant public game of cat and mouse, interactive story-telling and ‘secret circus’, we told the story of a hapless Groom who just can’t help falling in love, and has to decide what to do when faced with three angry Brides…
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