A quaint staircase, with theatre posters, photographs and signs saying “Stage Door” and “Spare me the drama” lining the brick walls, takes you up to a charming little theatre with bright red seats and matching walls.
This cosy auditorium, inspired by fringe theatres in London, is The Courtyard Playhouse. Located in The Courtyard in Dubai’s Al Quoz cultural district, it is a purpose-built 58-seat auditorium that offers an intimate space for the city’s performing arts community to hold workshops, rehearsals and performances.
The tiny theatre is the brainchild of Kemsley Dickinson and Tiffany Schultz, and it has already become a hub of the fringe art scene in the city by hosting exciting workshops and performances by local theatre, music, poetry and stand-up comedy groups.
Desert Monologues
Dickinson is a trained theatre actor from the United Kingdom, and has been actively involved with the amateur theatre scene in Dubai. He is well known for “The Desert Monologues”, a theatre workshop that he launched seven years ago.
Through his company Drama Dubai, he also conducts workshops on improvisation, and drama-based corporate development workshops. Schultz, who is from South Africa has a degree in Fine Art and is passionate about performing-art photography and theatre. The couple met when she auditioned for a play that Dickinson was directing.
The Courtyard Playhouse is quite literally a labour of love for the couple. They have spent over a year laying the flooring, painting the walls and doing everything it needs to transform what used to be a soulless office space into a theatre with professional lighting, sound system and backstage facilities.
They also involved the community in their dream project by conducting a successful crowd-funding campaign that has helped them to put the finishing touches to the theatre.
Workshops
“This is a grassroots performing-arts training centre. We designed it to be our perfect classroom and a place to showcase the talent of our students through our own productions. And we are very excited to hold ‘The Desert Monologues’ and ‘Improvisation’ workshops and Tiffany’s digital photography workshops in our own venue.
But the idea was also to provide an affordable space for local performers to present non-commercial shows. The existing venues in Dubai are quite large and very expensive. And if you hire these big auditoriums your choice of material is compromised by the necessity of filling the seats. But with a small theatre like this people can experiment with new talent and fresh themes that are relevant here,” Dickinson says.
“We personally missed having fringe theatres in Dubai. So we visited many fringe theatres in London and interacted with the managers to understand how to create the optimum environment for promoting home-grown performers here,” Schultz adds.
The Courtyard Playhouse opened its doors to the public in December 2013 with the first ever “Theatresports” show in the Middle East.
“Theatresports is an improvisation show where teams of improvisers issue dramatic challenges to each other and the winner is decided by the points awarded by the audience. It represents an approach to improvisation that focuses on creating stories on the spur of the moment.
"The format was devised by Keith Johnstone and has become popular worldwide. We are the first licensed Theatresports provider in the Middle East, and the response to our workshops and shows has been great. We have also invited award-winning improviser Patti Styles, who has trained with Johnstone, to hold a week of workshops here in April,” Dickinson says.
Other events hosted by the theatre include experimental music performances, play readings, stand-up comedy shows and workshops, and a Valentine’s Day celebration, featuring 12 improvisers performing scenes, songs and games based on audience suggestions in a bid to become the first improvisation Maestro in the region. It has also been used for bespoke corporate training programmes, where Dickinson uses elements of his acting and improvisation workshops to boost confidence, and improve communication, listening, team-building and problem-solving skills of the participants.
“Our long-term goal is to become the first theatre in Dubai to have an in-house company of actors for our home productions, and to promote grassroots performances in various fields of art that are written, produced and performed entirely by home-grown talent. Our first ‘Grass Roots Revue’ will be held from April 3 to April 5. The programme includes a montage of short plays, stand-up comedy, sketches, music, performance poetry and improvisation featuring only home-grown talent. We plan to have this kind of grassroots night every season, and hope to gradually increase to monthly and eventually weekly events,” Dickinson says.
“The arts community has been very supportive of our project. We hope corporate sponsors also step in to play their part in helping us to maintain the venue and the momentum,” Schultz adds.
Jyoti Kalsi is an arts enthusiast based in Dubai.
