SHOWCASE: 'THE STRANGE CASE OF DR JEKYLL AND MR HYDE’ AT LEITH THEATRE
Of late, our focus has been all things building so it has brought us a warm late winter glow dipping in and out of the Glasgow Film Festival programme and cramming in all things Oscars before the big night.
Our electrics and plumbing are a far cry from where they were last March, a time when we were much closer to film production ourselves. We had just wrapped the most incredible film and theatre hybrid, that was shot and enacted across the building. With more than 20 live sets on site and a full gamut of expertise from every film and theatre department imaginable, National Theatre of Scotland and Selkie Productions brought their innovative vision of Stevenson’s classic ‘The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde’ to Leith Theatre. Not only did they deliver a live experience unlike any other that the building has seen, but the film component permanently captured the theatre space in its own costume, as 1890’s Edinburgh.
Since moving out of our building, the film has been on its post-production journey, reconfigured for screens both little and large across the country. It’s been a joy to follow along in anticipation of watching it in its final and polished form before it hits Sky Arts in autumn of this year. Additional footage has been filmed on location around the city of Edinburgh, extra music has been composed and the sound mixed - all to ensure that every element adds to the drama of a story circling good and evil, and to meet the heights of the equally dramatic performances of the cast.
Importantly, the process of hosting a production of this complexity and scale gave Leith Theatre its own platform. It gathered a creative network to come and use the building - just as we were - whilst putting the theatre on everyone’s radar for the future. In months that are often known for their dark and quiet, we just happened to be brimming with fresh thinking and creative storytelling. The LT team gained confidence, learnt fast and, behind the scenes, captured the building’s near untapped value as a location through their “the making of” content creation.
As we pass the one year mark since the project’s opening night, we want to extend a massive thank you to Hope Dickson Leach, the talented cast and crew, and National Theatre of Scotland. It brings us so much joy knowing that, this year, your March has been filled with finalising footage shot right here in our venue. With the production taking these final strides, it is a great reminder of our circular economies, as this amazing, creative project (along with others), has contributed to the electrical and building works currently being undertaken at Leith Theatre.
See you on Sky TV 💙
“For our innovative hybrid project, ‘The Strange Case of Jekyll and Hyde’, we wanted to find somewhere that not only provided what we needed to create a filmic and theatrical piece of work, but also a location where the audience felt a part of the creation itself. We were inviting audiences to be present at the moment of transformation from a live performance into a piece of cinema, just as we were telling the story of a man who transforms into another man. Using a theatre to be two things at once was a wonderful mirror to tell the story about a man who also is two things at the same time. Leith Theatre not only filled that brief, but gave us so much more. It was instrumental not only in realising the project, but also inspiring it. The way in which the theatre retains all the ‘stories’ of the projects it has housed and experiences it has presented allowed me to see how the work we were creating was part of a cultural legacy of not just the building, but the community as well.
As someone who lives in the neighbourhood, I had first been in the building for Hidden Door and had then visited again for EIF performances. Having spent the last six months getting to know the building and team as part of the production, it gave me the opportunity to dream up opportunities for our show, but also gave me time to consider the possibilities of what further uses it may have and experiences it can house for audiences.
The many and creative ways in which the team are curating and positioning the building for audiences and artists alike fills me with excitement: what will I see there next? This is a building that is not just two things at the same time, but a myriad.”
- Hope Dickson Leach, Filmmaker