About Plue

Like a rarefied circus act, it is part minimalist dance, part installation. Mesmerising and nerve-wracking.
Neil Norman (on Orchard, 2018)

Very moving. An emotional watch with mesmeric movement.
Audience Feedback on Plue

A queer disappearing act examining visibility and intimacy, this hypnotic duet occupies and explores the gap between how queer people feel and how they’re seen.

Plue looks with love at how queer people appear and disappear as they adjust and re-position for the gaze of others. It is the dance of what, as queer people, we choose to share, what we feel pressured to hide, and what we can’t hide even if we tried.

Award-winning performance artist Eli Lewis and internationally-renowned choreographer and dance artist Joe Garbett’s first collaboration explores connection and disconnection, navigations of intimacy, and how we bridge distance to connect with care.

Following the performance on Friday 4 April, queer dance maker, educator and thinker, Orrow Bell (they/them) will host an informal, post show conversation about queerness with the audience, including games and opportunities to ask questions. Grab a drink, meet the cast and dive into a deeper perspective of the queer themes that run through Plue.

About Eli Lewis and Joe Garbett

Eli Lewis (they/them) is an award-winning performance artist making work that straddles dance and live art. Currently a WorkPlace associate artist at The Place, their practice explores where precarity intersects with queerness, ecology, absence, collapse, intimacy and care. Joe Garbett (he/him) is an internationally toured choreographer and dance artist making outdoor dance that bursts from unlikely, rural settings with playful energy, inviting people to connect and indulge in spontaneous silliness.

Cast & Creatives

Concept and Choreography: Eli Lewis and Joe Garbett
Performers: Joe Garbett and Jay Yule
Dramaturgy: Orrow Bell
Choreographic Support: Jay Yule, Natifah White, J Neve Harrington, Kit Hall, Ania Varez, Riikka Lakea
Sound Design: Edvin Langfeld
Set Design: Hannah Sharp
Lighting Design: Jo Palmer
Costume Design: Berthe Fortin
Producer: Alison Thomas
Post Show Activity Design: Orrow Bell
Post Show Facilitators: Orrow Bell | Shivaangee Agrawal
Audience Connector: Lucia Fortune-Ely
Audio Description: Shivaangee Agrawal, with the support of Lesta Woo
Care Consultancy: Dais Hale
Wellbeing Support for Plue Team: Nicolette Wilson-Clarke

Environmental Consultancy: Danielle Pipe
Photographers and Videographers: Rocio Chacon, Beliza Buzollo, Maya Yoncali & Andy McCredie

Audio Description and Touch Tour

On Saturday 5 April, the show will be audio described for blind and partially sighted audience members. This audio description will be delivered live, through headsets that can be worn anywhere in the theatre. The audio description has been developed by Shivaangee Agrawal with the support of SoundScribe, and in keeping with the show’s themes, is hypnotic, intimate and careful.

The touch tour takes place at 6.30pm before the show, and is an opportunity for audience members to familiarise themselves with the performance space, set, lighting and costume through audio description, touch and embodied guidance. The show’s creators Eli Lewis and Joe Garbett will be present to add personal context and perform an audio described extract of the work.

Though the touch tour is designed for blind and partially sighted audience members, anyone is welcome to book a free ticket for this and join in. This sensory introduction to the work’s themes can help to ease you into the act of witnessing and experiencing the performance.

'Audio Description and Touch Tour' - Audio Version