Perspectives: Blue Now

with Simon Fisher Turner, Russell Tovey, Travis Alabanza, Jay Bernard, Joelle Taylor and Lucy Railton

Irish Sign Language (ISL) interpreted performance. Ela Cichocka, ISL interpreter. 

BLUE was Derek Jarman’s final film, completely shortly before his death in 1994. A single unchanging shot of celestial blue is accompanied by a kaleidoscopic soundtrack of voices  and music, and we hear Jarman reflecting on his own AIDS-related illnesses, on his mortality, and on loved ones lost to the virus. As AIDS progressively steals his sight, he searches for a vision that  ‘transcends the solemn geography of human limits.’

Simon Fisher Turner, who created the original soundtrack of the film in 1994, performs a new live score, created in collaboration with cellist and composer Lucy Railton. Directed by Neil Bartlett, BLUE NOW’s cast features four extraordinary contemporary voices; Travis Alabanza, Russell Tovey, Jay Bernard and Joelle Taylor , who deliver Jarman’s own powerful words (originally  voiced by Jarman himself, Tilda Swinton, Nigel Terry and John Quentin).

BLUE NOW is unique opportunity to reflect on the impact of the AIDS epidemic, and the importance of creating space for compassion, rage and poetry in the face of prejudice and oppression.

Directed by Neil Bartlett

Produced by James Mackay

BLUE NOW, in this live event version, was commissioned by WePresent by WeTransfer, first presented by WeTransfer in association with Fuel and Basilisk Communications, and originally produced by Fuel.

Presented by NCH