Dark Week 2015

As most of you may know, Ludlow Assembly Rooms is closed this week for annual maintenance, or Dark Week as we call it. Because we’re so busy all year round, often with multiple events happening every day, it is important that we devote one week a year to repairing any damages, touching up the paintwork, cleaning the carpets etc. etc. We thought you might like to know what we’re doing to the building to make it ready for your arrival next week!

The STUDIO is one of the most frequented hire rooms, and so was the most in need of some TLC courtesy of Dulux… Re-painted, cleaned and polished, this rooms is now as good as new!

Downstairs in our Oscars room, we’ve been hard at work taking apart and repairing over 150 chairs and 50 tables, making new curtains for the front of the stage and giving the room a thorough clean from top to bottom. Have a look and see for yourselves.

Across the way into the auditorium and similar scenes continue. Our tech team have been tirelessly carrying out the PAT testing (Portable Appliance Testing) as well as installing a brand new sound system. (Let’s make sure these speakers don’t fall on deaf ears – have a look at the website to see if any films or events tickle your fancy: http://www.ludlowassemblyrooms.co.uk/)

The ladies among you will be happy to know that the unsightly pink lavatory on the 3^rd floor is no more. Now it’s a much nicer shade of magnolia, but we won’t put a picture up on here – that would be a bit uncouth!

All of this would be absolutely impossible were it not for our invaluable team of volunteers. These wonderful people have given up time during their busy schedules to help out with Dark Week. Many of these people are also seen around the building during the week helping out in the VIC, or with stewarding and box office duties as part of our volunteer staff scheme. As a charity organisation we really couldn’t run without the help we get from our 130-odd volunteers. Even our CEO Helen Hughes is a volunteer! We are incredibly lucky to have such a devoted team of friendly people, keen to help out in their local community without asking for money in return.

If you are interested in becoming a part of our family of volunteers, or you just want to help out with the remainder of Dark Week (finishing on the 31^st), then please do get in touch with the Volunteer Co-ordinator, Faraway Gardener-Brown at faraway@ludlowassemblyrooms.co.uk or by phone at 01584 873229.

Ludlow Assembly Rooms: A Celebration of Art-House and Foreign Film

by Crispin Lord

Having searched high and low for work opportunities to fill my outrageously long University summer holiday (4 months…!) I was lucky enough to be offered an internship here at Ludlow Assembly Rooms. Over the next month I will be working in the marketing department, helping to publicise the new set of films, screenings and live shows we have coming up.

The thing that has really struck me during my first week here is the incredibly varied programme of events, especially when it comes to indie and foreign film. As the Assembly Rooms is a charity, rather than a run-for-profit organisation, we are able to focus on less mainstream cinema and more on more controversial films, which might otherwise be overlooked by most people.  Obviously we want to get bums on seats, but the amount of help given by our fantastic volunteers means there is room in the budget to not just try and sell out the auditorium with Hollywood blockbusters.

Even just a cursory glance over the upcoming film programme for September-October shows a wide-ranging selection of films and events, including a film that I’ve actually been waiting to watch for a while: The Wolfpack. The film itself is a documentary about the lives of the six Angulo brothers, whose father kept them locked inside their New York apartment for 17 years.

The Wolfpack movie poster - looking alarmingly like The Reservoir Dogs!

The boys learned about the outside world only through watching films, which they re-enacted with homemade props and costumes, until one day one of the brothers escaped and happened upon film director Crystal Moselle. The film captures the brothers at their most vulnerable as they begin their transition into the real world.

Mukunda Angulo in in THE WOLFPACK, a Magnolia Pictures release. Photo courtesy of Magnolia Pictures.

Director Crystal Moselle on the set of THE WOLFPACK, a Magnolia Pictures release. Photo courtesy of Magnolia Pictures. Photo credit Megan Delaney 

Ludlow Assembly Rooms is one of the few cinemas across the country that has chosen to show this incredible and unique film. Even though it won Best Documentary at the Edinburgh Film Festival and the Grand Jury Prize and Sundance Film Festival, none of the major UK cinema venues are putting it on. I think it’s quite incredible that a company as small as this, and with such a niche audience as it has, feels it has a duty to put on comparatively under-represented films like The Wolfpack. 

There are also a number of foreign films coming up in our September-October schedule, which really show the company’s dedication to artistic and creative film. Iranian director Mohsen Makhmalbaf’s film The President is being shown in September, and promises to be quite spectacular. 

From left to right: Dachi Orvelashvili and Misha Gomiashvili in THE PRESIDENT. Photo courtesy of 20 Steps Productions

It tells the story of a fictional middle-Eastern dictator who is ousted by a coup d’état, and subsequently goes on the run in his own country with his five-year-old grandson. Posing as street musicians, the two are forced to experience the very hardships that provoked the president’s downfall. Makhmalbaf has said how this is not a simple story of good (the oppressed) triumphing over evil (the oppressor), but rather a comment on how revolutionary violence only leads to more violence, drawing influence from the Afghan dictatorship and the Arab Spring in 2010/2011. This is an incredibly informative film, and should not be avoided just because it is in Iranian (with subtitles…)! 

From left to right: Dachi Orvelashvili and Misha Gomiashvili in THE PRESIDENT. Photo courtesy of 20 Steps Productions

In an interview, the director perfectly summed up how important it is that companies such as Ludlow Assembly Rooms continue to programme thought-provoking art-house films:

“We need good films to educate people around the world… Not everyone can go to the university. Cinema is the university of people in poor countries”

-- Mohsen Makhmalbaf --

While England may not be one of those “poor countries” he’s referring to, his point about general education is completely relevant.

Ludlow Assembly Rooms’ very own Dido Blench and Helen Hughes, together with the help of the Independent Cinema Office, have created a September-October programme that is unapologetically diverse; there truly is something for everyone on it. Aside from the more intense and powerful films described above, there are more light-hearted ones too that are, however, no less creative and interesting. I feel honoured to be working as a part of this brilliantly creative team, even if it is only for four short weeks!