Interview about the Rough Mark performance

12 October 2022 Category: Gospels, Jesus, Media

I was very pleased to do a short interview on Premier radio about the Rough Mark premiere performance on Friday Oct 14th. The recording is now available here.

* Doors open at 7pm with informal bar available. Live tickets in advance/at the door £10 (£7.50 concessions), to cover production and performance costs with profits going to St Luke’s Church.

* To reserve a seat with advance card payment please email treasurer@saintlukeschurch.org.uk

* Any questions, or for further details, and for log-in details for the online live-stream (also online donations welcome of at least £5 or $10 USA), please email richard.burridge@manchester.ac.uk

It will also be simultaneously live-streamed on St Luke’s YouTube channel to encourage a wider, even international, audience, and it will be available for catch-up for a couple of weeks.

I have been translating gospel passages for my own prayer reflections since a 35-day silent Jesuit retreat at the home of St Ignatius in Loyola in the Basque country within Spain in 2019, and I have now finished Mark and Matthew, with Luke and John still to go. . . .! My solo performances of various sections of Mark to other New Testament scholars have already been received with acclaim. I will be reading the voice of Jesus myself, but I am thrilled to have two wonderful, professional actors starring alongside me:

• JUSTIN BUTCHER – writer, director, actor and musician, known for his award-winning plays, and also for his recent production based on his book about Walking to Jerusalem, 2018. Justin will be reading the part of St Mark as an Aramaic-speaking northerner (with a hint of Yoda and Geoffrey Boycott!).

• ANDY HARRISON – is a well-known actor from both stage and TV, especially his one-man shows and his famous versatility at representing multiple characters will be displayed as he gives voice to everyone in the gospel, except Jesus.

St Mark and his lion, with his opening words; taken from the East Window of St Luke’s, Holloway. Photo Stef Cagnoni

Experience this live oral performance like the ancients!

With first-century literacy rates at only around 10-15% of people being able to read and write, ancient texts were received by hearers through the ears by being read out loud or even performed, rather than through the eyes as in the modern habit of silent reading. Ancient texts were written on 35-feet long scrolls, one of which could be recited in a single evening, rather than today’s habit of hearing or studying small passages of a single story on our own. This text is a new literal, word-by-word, translation, to reflect as closely as possible the Greek text keeping the original word-order and derivations, the original tenses, word-plays and puns in the Greek, reflecting its Semitic background, recognizing that Greek was clearly not the author’s mother-tongue.

* Doors open at 7pm with informal bar available. Live tickets in advance/at the door £10 (£7.50 concessions), to cover production and performance costs with profits going to St Luke’s Church.

* To reserve a seat with advance card payment please email treasurer@saintlukeschurch.org.uk

It will also be simultaneously live-streamed on St Luke’s YouTube channel to encourage a wider, even international, audience, and it will be available for catch-up for a couple of weeks.

For advance tickets or online donations, contact Mike Dark, treasurer@saintlukeschurch.org.uk