These recent times have been some of the hardest challenges we've faced and as a community, it hit us pretty hard. However during these difficult times, here at Pocket Size Theatre, we wanted to spread a little positivity and share some peoples experiences because we are all in this together. Each day we'll be speaking to our friends in the industry to share their experiences with you all so take a read and see how people are getting through these hard times.
Let's stick together, share the love and get through this as a community!
*Some information mentioned in this article may be out of date due to the progress of the current situation. Please keep that in mind when reading*
Claire-Marie Hall was most recently seen in The Wicker Husband at the Watermill Theatre. Her other credits include Operation Mincemeat (Southwark Playhouse); The Colours (Soho Theatre); Ruth in Mites & Woman in The Sorrows of Satan (Tristan Bates Theatre); The Grinning Man (Trafalgar Studios); Between Empires (St James Theatre & Edinburgh Fringe); Tuptim in The King and I (National Tour & Leicester Curve); Gabriella in High School Musical (UK Tour & Hammermith Apollo) and Cosette in Les Miserables (Queens Theatre).
On Monday 16th March 2020, The Society of London Theatre announced the closure of all Theatres in London. This followed suit with regional venues. Where were you when you found out and what was your initial reaction?
I was actually in the midst of opening The Wicker Husband at the Watermill Theatre in Newbury. We had all been living on site in the middle of the countryside for the last few weeks during rehearsals, so I think we all felt to some degree quite separate and safe from the events going on in London. Then literally a couple of hours before we were about to do our press night show, Boris made the speech advising people not to go to the theatre at all. We were lucky enough to still have our press night (Paul Hart made a speech giving people the option to leave if they wished, but everyone stayed) but then the rest of the run was cancelled and all of a sudden we had to go back home. It was like a massive crash back to this really warped version of reality.
Can you tell us anything productive you’ve been doing?
A big positive thing about this whole time is that I’ve finally found a lot of time to be productive in a creative sense. Whenever I’m not in an acting contract, I’m usually doing my office side job, or doing freelance PR work, or gigging, or learning material for this, that and the other. I always complained that I never had time to do anything just for myself, so being forced to stay at home and not work has in some ways been a blessing. I’ve started re-learning the piano which I’ve really enjoyed. I’ve actually started practising the Grade 6 syllabus now with the intention of taking it next year which I never would have done before. I’ve done quite a few fun, quick turnaround performance projects, from rehearsed readings to singing in concerts to filming a Shakespeare duologue. And I’ve managed to watch a large variety of theatre online, much more than I usually had the time to or could afford to.
Can you tell us anything productive you’ve been doing?
A big positive thing about this whole time is that I’ve finally found a lot of time to be productive in a creative sense. Whenever I’m not in an acting contract, I’m usually doing my office side job, or doing freelance PR work, or gigging, or learning material for this, that and the other. I always complained that I never had time to do anything just for myself, so being forced to stay at home and not work has in some ways been a blessing. I’ve started re-learning the piano which I’ve really enjoyed. I’ve actually started practising the Grade 6 syllabus now with the intention of taking it next year which I never would have done before. I’ve done quite a few fun, quick turnaround performance projects, from rehearsed readings to singing in concerts to filming a Shakespeare duologue. And I’ve managed to watch a large variety of theatre online, much more than I usually had the time to or could afford to.
