Oily Cart, the leading theater company have formed a collaboration with national disability charity Sense in order to produce the company’s first ever production for children and young people who are deaf and blind. It was announced last week that the Birmingham service for both children and adults with complex needs received a sneak peak of the new production put on by the leading theater company Oily Cart.
The show is entitled ‘Kubla Khan’ and has been developed with help from Sense, the national disability charity. The production is aimed at young people that have complex disabilities. This will be the first ever production performed by Oily Cart that will also have a version for children who are deafblind and tailored performances for young people on the autism spectrum as well as other adaptations for those with profound and multiple learning disabilities.
The new show has been inspired by the Samuel Taylor Coleridge poem and it has been experienced by 20 people across two performances. The performance is described as a multi-sensory dome that the audience can touch, taste and smell. The performance also includes the sitar to evoke the sounds of the flowing river and temperature, texture and aroma change to go along with the performance.
The main reason for choosing to perform Coleridge’s poem is the great deal of description which allows opportunity for interpretation though different senses. The response from the audience was positive and the performance has the ability to appeal to a wide variety of audiences. The production follows the set of workshops that were developed by Oily Cart and Sense that took place earlier in the year. The information taken from these workshops contributed to the final production.
Kubla Khan will go on tour from August and should be a production that is a success as it stimulates the mind as well as the senses.
