As our month-long run is nearing its end, and focuses begin to turn to both the future as well as the previous days, weeks and months, it seemed like as a good a time as any to finally write my first blog post for CloseKnit Theater.

Experience is one of the things that seems to spring to my mind first when looking back; using hindsight and self-reflection to ask: What have I learnt during my time here? What have we learnt as a company? As a community of people? But these seem almost impossible questions to answer right now.

I suppose things such as these cannot be known straight away, and therefore the experiential benefits of what we have undertaken over the past few weeks, of which I’m sure there will be many, will not be known for some time; lessons are often only learnt or acknowledged when we are faced with similar situations in the future; when we think about (whether it be as writers, producers, directors, designers, performers, or any of the roles that it takes to make theatre happen) how we have developed as people and professionals and what we have achieved so far as a group of creative people.

But the focus of gain that has undoubtedly affected us all, that seems so immediate, so constant, and is in many ways the most important gain of all, is that of community; the sense of community that CloseKnit’s project (and the experience that goes with it) has established amongst all of us. This is what theatre, and art, does; it binds and unites people (whether as artist or spectator) under a common cause. It creates, and solidifies communities of people in it’s (paradoxically) ephemeral embrace.

And so, with an awareness of sounding a little clichéd, and with a glimmer of hindsight on my side, it seems safe to say that this has been a phenomenal experience that I have shared with people both new to me as well as old; an experience I will take with me for quite some time, and that came about from a group of people getting together and sharing their lives with each other to make theatre happen. I guess that’s what it means to be close-knit.

Nick B
(the guy who plays Reynard in the show)