About

The Talent

by Action Hero and Deborah Pearson

A woman in a sound booth is talking. She is talking to herself. She is talking to you. She is talking to everyone. She is gifted, professional, mercurial; it seems as if she can summon almost any kind of voice and create any kind of world.

She is selling you something

She is telling you a story

She sounds like a cereal ad

She sounds like a cartoon

She sounds like a meditation tape

She sounds like a shapeshifter

She sounds like the ocean

You would listen to her say anything. Her voice is all around. Her voice is all that’s left. She conjures her own ghost in real time.

…..

On stage is a small sound booth; inside it sits a woman, alone. She is a voice-over artist. Off stage, in a space never seen but only heard, two disembodied voices ask her to conjure different voices for commercials, self-help audiobooks, meditation tapes, computer games, robo-calls .... anything and everything. Is she the powerful protagonist in her own narrative, literally building her own reality - and ours too - or is her voice being used to construct something more complicated? It's capitalism's audio debris, a vocal soup that, in a post-apocalyptic world, will continue to be heard for as long as there is electricity.

The Talent is a show about the voice and human presence in the 21st Century. Where does the voice live? How will her voice live on, outside her body, if it can take on a life of its own?

The Talent asks what kind of ghosts will haunt us when we’re gone, and what the legacy of the human voice might be in a non- human future.

Commissioned by Teatro Barrio Alto (PT) Cambridge Junction (UK) & South Street Arts/ University of Reading (UK). With support from PACT Zollverein (DE) and Bristol Old Vic Ferment (UK). Thanks to Queen Mary University, University of Bristol and The Yard. Action Hero are a National Portfolio Organisation of Arts Council England.

Text and direction: Deborah Pearson, Gemma Paintin & James Stenhouse

Performer: Gemma Paintin

Sound design: Yaseen Clarke

Lighting Design: Alex Fernandes

Set Design: Camilla Clarke

Outside eye: Tania El Khoury

Producer for Action Hero: Sarah Warden

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General Information:

Guests who use a wheelchair or experience mobility impairments are asked to call the box office on 01273 678822 or email info@attenboroughcentre.com so that we can assist you to find the best seat to suit your requirements.

Personal assistance tickets are available for free for customers who would otherwise be unable to attend the venue. Please contact the box office on 01273 678822 or email info@attenboroughcentre.com for further information.

The Box Office (phone line and drop-in service) is open from 10am to 4pm, Mondays to Fridays. The box office is also open one hour before the advertised show start time.