Barbican Theatre, Plymouth is excited to launch the first of their covid safe pop up performances for the communities of Plymouth.

On Friday 14 August three small flashmob teams will visit six day centres and care homes across Plymouth for safe, socially distanced pop up performances of ‘Singing in The Rain’, while many celebrate National Afternoon Tea Week (10-16 August).

Laura Kriefman, recently appointed CEO of Barbican Theatre says

“This is our gift to the staff and residents of care homes and day centres in Plymouth as a thank you for taking such great care and enduring such hard times during Covid -19. Although we are not through the pandemic, we would like to offer them a little light entertainment, a refreshing bit of joy, and lots of fun!”

Barbican Theatre has partnered with a number of other dance schools and organisations in the city to deliver this project, including Plymouth Dance, Rhythm City, and Linda Mortimore & Charlotte Smith School of Dance plus Barbican Theatre’s COMPANY b Dance, Dance Junction and FUSE Diverse Dance team.

Laura continues

“We are committed to bringing dancers and performing artists from across our city together to create and inspire as we still deal with the pandemic’s effects on our lives. Safety is very important to us so rehearsals have mostly been via Zoom. It’s amazing what can be achieved even when you’re not in the same room!”

Each pop up performance will feature a small group of 6-10 dancers from the local community. After each performance the residents can have socially distanced conversations and dancing with the performers. An activity pack has also been created for the care homes which includes access to a music playlist, links to the original Singing in The Rain film, and activities that could accompany the film and any other National Afternoon Tea Week activities they have.

Suzie West, Barbican Theatre’s Lead Dance Practitioner & Choreographer and the flashmob co-ordinator says

“This has been an incredible project to work on. We’ve got some fantastic dancers in our performances and I can’t wait to see how the residents and staff react when they start to perform right on their doorstep! We’ll be performing the majority outside whatever the weather – luckily we have umbrellas!”

Barbican Theatre are working on more socially distanced performance projects like this for the communities and people of Plymouth to enjoy. Further details will be announced shortly.

View the performance schedule here: Singing In The Rain pop up flashmob schedule