programme for
september to december 2009

Fri 4th - Sun 6th September

Intimate Encounters is an interactive performance installation exploring the concept of intimacy. Just as diamonds can be designed for the individual, Intimate Encounters is tailor-made. In this experiential encounter the performers are constantly responding to each participant's reactions, resulting in a unique performance being created by this dynamic fusion. This Art Treatment allows each participant to be the most important person in the room. Another new venture at the New Venture!

The performance involves extreme darkness and physical contact with the performers. Staggered entrance throughout the evening. Each performance lasts about 45 minutes.

Performances:
Friday 4th -- 19:00, 19:30, 20:00, 20:30, 21:00, 21:30
Saturday 5th -- 14:00, 14:30, 15:00, 15:30, 16:00, 16:30
Saturday 5th -- 19:00, 19:30, 20:00, 20:30, 21:00, 21:30
Sunday 6th -- 14:00, 14:30, 15:00, 15:30, 16:00, 16:30

Sat 10th - Sat 17th October

With the expensive purchase of a modern painting, three friends find themselves involved in a bitter examination of their friendship which threatens to tear them apart and expose their most private insecurities.

Few modern plays have had quite the impact of Yasmina Reza's Art when it premiered in 1996. Its comedic and tragic elements are so cleverly interwoven that you don't know whether to laugh or cry. The NVT's production builds on the initial success whilst adding the immediacy of the unique performance space to create a fresh version of this modern classic. Complementing the play will be a free entry exhibition in the South Hall Gallery of paintings by local artist Ben Fearnside.

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Sat 7th - Sat 14th November

Bold Girls is a drama of everyday life in 1990's Belfast - burning buses, roadblocks, gunfire are but offstage events in this stirring play about the lives of women, whose men have been killed or imprisoned for their political activities, but where bread must still be bought between explosions.

Set in Marie's kitchen, ordinary life goes on, but the appearance of a disturbing young girl threatens Marie's carefully structured widowhood. Pretences are shattered as, finally, truths about their menfolk are painfully exposed. In spite of its chilling theme there are many humorous and heart-warming moments - a play about people not politics. This play won the Evening Standard's Most Promising Playwright Award in 1991.

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Sat 5th - Sat 12th December

Two dysfunctional policemen, Constables Blunt and Gobbel, are sent to break some bad news to an elderly couple at home on Christmas Eve. Their actions are delayed by indecision and the interruption of a vigilante group led by the larger-than-life character of Gronya. When they get to achieve their task, it seems the news has beaten them. What follows is a series of misunderstandings, uncertainty and confusion that build into this excellent modern-day black farce.

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Please note:

Please check performance times with the box office before booking your tickets.

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