An Tobar cafe and gallery are open Monday - Friday, 10am - 4pm
What’s On
Papatango
The best new writing. Made for audio. Delivered to you.
In a reimagined iteration of Papatango’s annual playwriting awards, three winning plays have been produced as audio productions. The thirteenth Papatango New Writing Prize winning plays are Nkenna Akunna’s Some Of Us Exist In The Future, Tom Powell’s The Silence and The Noise, and Tajinder Singh Hayer’s Ghost Stories from an Old Country.
The audio productions will play from free listening devices which can be booked and collected from our Box Office, or listened to on your own device via a QR code.
Listen to the three award-winning plays in the comfortable surroundings of Mull Theatre!
Some Of Us Exist In The Future
by Nkenna Akunna
Chiamaka is new to all this. Fresh off the plane from the UK, she’s new to Brooklyn and its extremes. She’s new to queer dating. She’s new to being an immigrant. Most of all, she’s new to the voices of the gods…
Utterly original, wryly funny and always gripping, Some Of Us Exist In The Future follows one woman’s journey to finding her place in a world that’s not all it seems.
Directed by Rasheka Christie-Carter
Composer and Sound Designer: Xana
Cast includes: babirye bukilwa, Florian Clare, Funmi James, Rachel Nwokoro and Oseloka Obi
Ghost Stories From An Old Country
by Tajinder Singh Hayer
Dalvir has always told a good ghost story, properly unsettling, dark tales to send a chill right through his younger brother Amar. But now Dalvir’s almost a ghost himself, cloistered and secretive. Amar desperately wants to reconnect with the only family he has left, but can he unravel Dalvir’s stories to find a way back to his brother?
Threaded through with captivating fables, Ghost Stories From An Old Country is a riveting and poignant exploration of the ties that bind us.
Directed by Jessica Lazar
Composer and Sound Designer: Farokh Soltani
Cast includes: Rebecca Crankshaw, Raj Ghatak and Shane Zaza
The Silence and The Noise
by Tom Powell
Every teenager knows what it’s like to be stuck between things: childhood and maturity, innocence and experience, hope for the future and uncertainty about what that will be. But Daize is torn between even greater challenges: her love for her vulnerable mother and her dangerous friendship with Ant. An outsider with knockout trainers, Ant has just appeared on her doorstep, bringing with him a whole world of trouble.
The Silence and The Noise beautifully captures the story of two young people on the edge.
Directed by George Turvey
Composer and Sound Designer: Asaf Zohar
Cast includes: Aldous Ciokajlo-Squire and Shakira Riddell-Morales
★★★★★“A modest masterpiece.”The StageonThe Silence and The Noise
★★★★"A deep and moving exploration of brotherhood."The StageonGhost Stories From An OldCountry
★★★★“Emotionally rewarding,refreshing andrelevant all at once.”West End Best FriendonSomeOf Us Exist In The Future
Flic'n Food: The Grinch
Doors open at 2pm for 2.30pm screening.
The Piece Box are providing each child with a goodie bag containing a sandwich, pizza or sausage roll, veg & fruit slices & sweet treats. There will be drinks available.
The cafe will also be open for the grown-ups.
Bring a cushion for your youngsters to sit on the floor during the film.
For their eighth fully animated feature, Illumination and Universal Pictures present The Grinch, based on Dr. Seuss' beloved holiday classic. The Grinch tells the story of a cynical grump who goes on a mission to steal Christmas, only to have his heart changed by a young girl's generous holiday spirit. Funny, heartwarming, and visually stunning, it's a universal story about the spirit of Christmas and the indomitable power of optimism. Academy Award nominee Benedict Cumberbatch lends his voice to the infamous Grinch, who lives a solitary life inside a cave on Mt. Crumpet with only his loyal dog, Max, for company.
Open Mic In An Tobar Café
Come join us for two Open Mic sessions with Graham Alexander, on Sunday 28 Nov and Sunday 5 Dec, from 6pm till 9pm. BYOB.
H I D D E N
Our 2021 Open Exhibition theme is Hidden.
Beneath the surface.
Undersea, underground.
A presence you feel but cannot see.
Every Brilliant Thing
An Tobar & Mull Theatre presents
Every Brilliant Thing
by Duncan Macmillan with Jonny Donahoe
Directed by Rebecca Atkinson-Lord
Starring Naomi Stirrat
You’re seven years old. Mum’s in hospital. Dad says she’s ‘done something stupid’. She finds it hard to be happy.
You make a list of everything that’s brilliant about the world.
Everything worth living for.
1. Ice cream
2. Water fights
3. Staying up past your bedtime and being allowed to watch TV
4. The colour yellow
5. Things with stripes
6. Rollercoasters
7. People falling over
You leave it on her pillow. You know she’s read it because she’s corrected your spelling.
A hilarious play about depression and the lengths we will go to for those we love.
Based on true and untrue stories.
For all Mull venues tickets are available through the comar ticket link.
Tour Dates & Venues:
5 Nov - Mull Theatre 7.30pm
6 Nov - Mull Theatre 7.30pm
7 Nov - Iona Hall 7.30pm
8 Nov - Bunessan Hall 7.30pm
9 Nov - Pennyghael Hall 7.30pm
10 Nov - Salen Church 7.30pm
12 Nov - Craignure Hall 7.30pm
13 Nov - Dervaig Village Hall 7.30pm
16 Nov - Rockfield Centre Oban 7pm, tickets availabe here
17 Nov - Beacon Arts Centre Greenock 8pm, tickets available here
18 Nov - Lochgoilhead Village Hall 7.30pm, tickets available here
19 Nov - Three Villages Hall, Arrochar 7.30pm, tickets available here
20 Nov - Cove Burgh Hall 8pm, tickets available here
24 Nov - CatStrand, New Galloway 7.30pm, tickets available here
26 Nov - Dunoon Burgh Hall 7.30pm, tickets available here
27 Nov - Birks, Aberfeldy 7.30pm, tickets available here
Reviews for the original production:
“Heart-wrenching, hilarious… possibly one of the funniest plays you'll ever see, full stop”
★★★★ The Guardian
“Captivating… guaranteed to keep your eyes brimming… often very funny… takes the chill off the depths of a light-starved winter”
New York Times
Every Brilliant Thing
An Tobar & Mull Theatre presents
Every Brilliant Thing
by Duncan Macmillan with Jonny Donahoe
Directed by Rebecca Atkinson-Lord
Starring Naomi Stirrat
You’re seven years old. Mum’s in hospital. Dad says she’s ‘done something stupid’. She finds it hard to be happy.
You make a list of everything that’s brilliant about the world.
Everything worth living for.
1. Ice cream
2. Water fights
3. Staying up past your bedtime and being allowed to watch TV
4. The colour yellow
5. Things with stripes
6. Rollercoasters
7. People falling over
You leave it on her pillow. You know she’s read it because she’s corrected your spelling.
A hilarious play about depression and the lengths we will go to for those we love.
Based on true and untrue stories.
For all Mull venues tickets are available through the comar ticket link.
Tour Dates & Venues:
5 Nov - Mull Theatre 7.30pm
6 Nov - Mull Theatre 7.30pm
7 Nov - Iona Hall 7.30pm tonight's performance is cancelled due to ferry cancelations.
8 Nov - Bunessan Hall 7.30pm
9 Nov - Pennyghael Hall 7.30pm
10 Nov - Salen Church 7.30pm
12 Nov - Craignure Hall 7.30pm
13 Nov - Dervaig Village Hall 7.30pm
16 Nov - Rockfield Centre Oban 7pm, tickets available here
17 Nov - Beacon Arts Centre Greenock 8pm, tickets available here
18 Nov - Lochgoilhead Village Hall 7.30pm, tickets available here
19 Nov - Three Villages Hall, Arrochar 7.30pm, tickets available here
20 Nov - Cove Burgh Hall 8pm, tickets available here
24 Nov - CatStrand, New Galloway 7.30pm, tickets available here
26 Nov - Dunoon Burgh Hall 7.30pm, tickets available here
27 Nov - Birks, Aberfeldy 7.30pm, tickets available here
Freshly cooked local food will be availabe from The Foodie Shack with made to order pizzas; pepperoni, mushroom and sausage £12, margherita £8, goats cheese, roasted red pepper and olives £12, mighty meat feast (pepperoni, chorizo, bacon and black pudding) £14, on Friday 5 Nov and from Isle of Mull Seaweed on Sat 6 Nov at Mull Theatre, Mon 8 at Bunessan Village Hall and Tue 9 at Pennyghael Hall, with slow-cooked braised beef curry or a chickpea chana masala, with a Seaweed Chutney accompaniment, delicious!
Reviews for the original production:
“Heart-wrenching, hilarious… possibly one of the funniest plays you'll ever see, full stop”
★★★★ The Guardian
“Captivating… guaranteed to keep your eyes brimming… often very funny… takes the chill off the depths of a light-starved winter”
New York Times
Please note this production references suicide.
Rehearsal photos: Sarah Darling Photography.
Holly Race: Midnight's Twins Author Reading And Q&A
Author Holly Race reads from her latest Midnight’s Twins novel and answers audience questions.
Midnight's Twins is a Young Adult fantasy trilogy set between our world and the mirror world we go to when we dream.
Fifteen-year-old Londoner Fern is about to uncover a place that she could not have imagined in all her wildest dreams. Annwn is the dream mirror of our world, a place where Dreamers walk in their slumber, their dreams playing out all around them. An enchanted, mysterious place that feeds our own world - as without dreams, without a place where our imaginations and minds can be nourished, what kind of humans would we be?
But Annwn is a place as full of dangers as it is wonders: it is a place where dreams can kill you. Annwn and its Dreamers are protected by an ancient order known as the Knights - and when Fern's hated twin Ollie is chosen to join their ranks, Fern will have to do whatever she can to prove she is one of them too.
Holly will be signing copies of her books (available to purchase from An Tobar) following the event.
For 12 years and above.
Scottish Dance Theatre: Antigone Interrupted
What do you do when the state becomes the oppressor? Would you put your body on the line?
A young girl ready to die to defend what she thinks is right. A king determined to impose his will as the rule of law. Antigone, Interrupted re-imagines a classic story for a contemporary world through the body and the voice of a single performer.
Scottish Dance Theatre Artistic Director Joan Clevillé presents an intimate solo work created in collaboration with acclaimed performer Solène Weinachter. Using his distinctive mixture of dance, theatre and storytelling, Clevillé examines the notion of dissent in democracy, and how the female body can be the target of oppression but also a powerful tool for resistance.
Conceived and directed by Joan Clevillé
Choreography Joan Clevillé in collaboration with Solène Weinachter
Performer Solène Weinachter
Lighting Design Emma Jones
Costume Design Matthias Strahm
Sound Design Luke Sutherland
Dramaturgy Ella Hickson
Voice Jean Sangster
Written by Joan Clevillé and featuring excerpts from Sophocles' original tragedy translated by Don Taylor and Owen McCafferty.
Antigone, Interrupted was commissioned by the Rural Touring Dance Initiative in association with Perth Theatre. Developed with the support of Creative Scotland, Dancebase, The Place, Scottish School of Contemporary Dance, Dundee & Angus College and The Work Room. R&D of Antigone, Interrupted supported via South East Dance and Jerwood Charitable Foundation Dramaturg in Residence programme.
Tickets are Pay What You Decide, book here
Rhiannon Armstrong: Poems Made From Words Found In The Bin
“An attempt to make something beautiful and true from shreds of discarded paper.”
Rhiannon will be in residence at An Tobar on 27 October, inviting members of the public to work with her to write poetry around shreds of paper found in bins in the town and beyond.
The resulting Poems Made from Words Found in the Bin are animated and added to a growing collection, written by people in Portsmouth, Lincoln, Brighton and London. Look out for the film of existing Poems Made from Words Found in the Bin, also on show at An Tobar.
The animated poems are then uploaded onto the Slow GIF Movement channel on Giphy, which allows your poem to be read and shared globally on messaging apps and social media. Once your poem is part of the collection it can go on to be screened in other places as the project travels, including (so far) advertising billboards in Brighton, Victorious Festival in Portsmouth, and Wellcome Collection in London.
Artist bio
Rhiannon Armstrong is the 2019 recipient of the Adrian Howells Award for Intimate Performance. She makes works with empathy, interaction, and dialogue at their core, and brings the audience-focus of a theatre background to richly inclusive, interdisciplinary work. This work includes performance, installation, street interventions, web-based works and audio projects.
Recent work includes ‘The Soothing Presence of Strangers’, a radio documentary about loneliness made with London bus drivers and broadcast on BBC Radio 3. Rhiannon is currently undertaking research and development on a new work exploring tactile ways of making and experiencing sound.
Photo credit: Leonardo Lami
This event is drop in, no booking required.
Ballet Masterclass
Ballet Masterclass
Intermediate level
Join us for an intentensive two hour workshop with Janine Allen.
Pay What You Decide, booking essential.
The Class Project
Arch 468 presents a Theatre in the Mill commission
The Class Project
Written & performed by Rebecca Atkinson-Lord
This is a show about belonging. About tribes and families. About the place you belong because you were born there; the places that are in your blood but also the places you adopt; that you pretend are your home and the places you change yourself to try and belong in.
It’s about class mobility. And regional identity. And being a Thatcher’s child. It’s about education and 'making good’ for yourself. And maybe about how that can leave you exiled from the place you started. With nowhere to quite belong.
It’s about always being an imposter and trying to remember how to speak in your own voice.
Book here
Audience feedback
“Loved The Class Project…eloquent, probing and poignant in every accent” – Rebecca Duncan
“A thoughtful piece of brilliance” – Porl Cooper
“Smart and necessary” – Gloria Lindh
“Thought provoking and movingly performed” – Matt Steinberg
The Class Project is a Theatre in the Mill commission, produced by Arch 468, funded by Arts Council England and supported by ARC Stockton, Derby Theatre, The Bike Shed and the Old Vic and by China Plate, mac birmingham, Warwick Arts Centre and In Good Company through the First Bite Festival.
Carolyne Mazur: Fangan
Fangan is an ongoing photographic record of the stone fanks of Mull, Iona and Ulva. A fank is a sheepfold or pen, these beautifully built structures illustrate changes in crofting and farming life over the last 200 years.
The gallery is open every Tuesday - Saturday, 10am - 4pm.
Sam Ainsley + Eileen Cooper + Pinkie Maclure
Sam Ainsley, Eileen Cooper and Pinkie Maclure.
Opening Night Saturday 4 Sept 6-8pm, all welcome.
An exhibition of narrative art, in stained-glass, prints and paintings.
A group exhibition that brings together three eminent women artists. The approach each of the artists takes varies greatly and for this group exhibition they present work in different two-dimensional media. There is a common thread in that each artist uses figuration, narrative and symbolism and a strong female perspective.
Sam Ainsley, RSA. D.Litt. and Saltire prize winner, former head of MFA course at GSA.
Artist, teacher, curator and advocate for Scottish art, Sam taught for twenty-five years at the Glasgow School of Art. The list of alumni for the time she served as head of the MFA course could be seen, to a large extent, to define Scottish contemporary art.
Her own work is an exploration of the human relationship with the world and with the experience of living.
Notions of human existence are scrutinised and re-formed visually through multiple themes; nature, landscape, the human body, politics and feminism, nationality. In a process she has described as "emotional mapping", her paintings and prints, when exhibited on a characteristic red painted wall, have a feel of a dissection of life-force, as seen through the eyes of a female contemporary artist.
Eileen Cooper, OBE RA and the first woman appointed as Keeper of the Royal Academy.
Known primarily as a painter and printmaker, throughout her career Eileen Cooper’s work has been figurative.
"Stories are never far away. Mythology, fairytales, bible stories, comics, they are all inspirations."
“From my roots in objective drawing to the large-scale imaginative works, the female figure and female identity has always been central to my practice.” [Eileen Cooper]
Through meticulous use of composition and symbolism which often features the relationship between people and animals, her work over the decades has mapped a personal relationship with the world. Her art is seen as allegorical, literally drawn from her life, being a woman and a wife and a mother and an artist.
Pinkie Maclure, award-winning stained-glass artist and musician.
Pinkie Maclure is a multi-award-winning Scottish artist who uses the allegorical power of stained-glass as used by historical glassmakers, to tell contemporary stories. Linking the characters and events of the past with the world today.
Historically, stained-glass was invented to communicate to a largely illiterate population, its vivid colours having a unique, seductive quality that’s hard to resist. However, its narrative role has been largely abandoned in the last century, this is something Pinkie is challenging, by making work that reflects the world around us today.
For this exhibition, she is showing four finely detailed, engraved and layered stained glass light boxes which tell darkly humorous stories about contemporary life, from consumerism to insomnia.
Calendar view