Name: Storiescapes
Start: 2024-11-20T20:00:00+01:00
End: 2024-11-20T21:00:00+01:00
Location: ARC Stockton Arts Centre

Presented by Full Circle Theatre Company
After the huge success of their Our Stomping Grounds Festival in June, and their sell out show at Stockton International Riverside Festival, Full Circle Theatre Company is back with a brand new show, Storiescapes, promising to bring their trademark style of powerful, poignant and witty highly visual theatre back to ARC’s main stage.
This striking new piece of work from the learning disabled ensemble of actors is set in an Escape Room where their stories are set to be locked away and hidden for hundreds of years. Each of the actors embodies a story and fights to break free to allow it to be told.
The company’s starting point was to explore autobiographies and looked at whose stories make it to the bookshelves, asking who decides whose stories are valued most. Does it have to be only celebrities? In Storiescapes, Full Circle ask whether the stories of learning disabled people will ever be told properly? From their point of view?
In this exciting and dramatic piece of visual theatre, the actors are trapped and slowly realise that the Escape Room is full of puzzles and challenges which could provide them with a route of escape. They share their stories and dreams with each other and the audience… Lonely Guy dreams of being a DJ but his story is stuck on an old vinyl record. Drummer wants to be part of a musical goth community – can the Tall Man and the Crow help him release his story from the tomb? Adventurer and Poet want to write a wildlife book and go on a wild duck hunt. Crisp Bag is looking for love. Festival Boi, Party Animal and Music Man have got the vibes but can they channel their energies into an escape? Opera and Hostess want to lift everyone’s spirits in the darkness. Goose Bumps and Dolls House want dignity and respect – can they lead the group to freedom? And who is the mysterious Horse Lass with six white horses?
What will happen to the world if all these stories break free? You’ll have to book tickets and come and see.
Access – the show will be BSL interpreted and have integrated captions.
Content and sensory awareness – please note that Full Circle has a very visual theatrical style with stage lighting and an impactful set design of an escape room. There is colourful lighting and sometimes it creates a shadowy effect but there are no flashing lights or strobes. At the beginning of the performance all appears happy in the world of the actors as they go about their business but with a few rumbles of thunder the security force arrives to lock them into the escape room. There are some loud clanking door sounds to symbolise being locked in and there is some sinister style music to let us know they are in a new and unhappy world. But Full Circle have a brilliant way of bringing things back to a safer feeling space with humour and fantastic music. There is some suspense as we don’t know if they will escape to be able to tell their stories, and there are some occasional loud sound effects to create the effect. There is lots of lively and characterful music throughout which some audiences love to clap along to. The show will have a lively ending and some audience members may want to get up and dance on stage with the company.
Age: 12+
Running time: 50 mins approx.
Tickets are priced on a Pay What You Decide basis - this means that tickets are available to book in advance as usual, but there is no obligation for you to pay until after you have seen the show, and how much you pay is completely up to you.
Book here: https://arconline.co.uk/whats-on/storiescapes/