• Review For Us
  • List Your Show
  • Advertising
  • Musicals
  • Plays
  • Ballet & Dance
  • Previews
  • First Look
Theatre Weekly
  • Home
  • News
    • West End
    • Off-West End
    • Regional & Tours
  • Reviews
  • Interviews
  • Digital Theatre
  • Tickets
    • Discounts
    • Musicals
    • Plays
    • Opera
    • Dance
    • Concerts
  • Edinburgh Fringe 2022
    • Edinburgh News
    • Edinburgh Previews
    • Edinburgh Interviews
    • Edinburgh Reviews
  • Contact Us
    • Join us as a Reviewer
No Result
View All Result
Theatre Weekly
  • Home
  • News
    • West End
    • Off-West End
    • Regional & Tours
  • Reviews
  • Interviews
  • Digital Theatre
  • Tickets
    • Discounts
    • Musicals
    • Plays
    • Opera
    • Dance
    • Concerts
  • Edinburgh Fringe 2022
    • Edinburgh News
    • Edinburgh Previews
    • Edinburgh Interviews
    • Edinburgh Reviews
  • Contact Us
    • Join us as a Reviewer
No Result
View All Result
Theatre Weekly
No Result
View All Result
Home Edinburgh Fringe 2022
Oli Dunbar and Corey Weekes courtesy of Chloe Nelkin Consulting

Oli Dunbar and Corey Weekes courtesy of Chloe Nelkin Consulting

Edinburgh Interview: Oli Dunbar and Corey Weekes on Rapsody at Pleasance Courtyard

“I think there's just a lot of people coming from privileged backgrounds trying to talk about the working class, and it shows in the writing, it shows in the performance, so with Rapsody, it's raw, it's coming from a place of authenticity”

by Greg Stewart
August 1, 2022
Reading Time: 4 mins read

Oli Dunbar and Corey Weekes are the writers of Vision Production Company’s debut show Rapsody, the 2022 recipient of the Pleasance’s Charlie Hartill Theatre Reserve, which will play at Pleasance Courtyard this Edinburgh Fringe.

“We were both coming out of drama school, freshly graduated, and we both rapped ourselves,” says Oli,  “we thought you don’t really see that in theatre. So Corey proposed this idea of Rapsody to me, and at the beginning we didn’t really have any idea what it would be about, but we had the same sort of energy of it being set somewhere like a hostel, somewhere where the characters hated their environment and came from a class similar to ours.”

“So we just went off that feeling, and that’s how it developed over time. In the lockdowns, we started writing it, and then did a little R&D last summer, which gave us the chance to finalise the script.”

       

The script turned in to the story of four young people living in a hostel, “three of them come from working class backgrounds, and one of them comes from a middle-class background,” explains Corey.  “It looks at how the entrance of someone from the middle upper class, changes the group.  When we were making the show, the first thing that we wanted to explore was the idea of people using rap music as a way to say things that they wouldn’t be able to just speak to someone.”

“So it’s all about hopes and dreams, and whether those hopes and dreams will be fulfilled, or whether they’ll be crushed.”

You mightalso like

Autopilot credit Mihaela Bodlovic

Edinburgh Review: Autopilot at Pleasance Courtyard

Oedipus Electronica Photo Credit Jo Thorne

Edinburgh Review: Oedipus Electronica at Pleasance Courtyard

Both Oli and Corey are excited to be bringing a show with rap music at it’s core to the Fringe, “way before I was acting, or writing plays, I was just rapping,” says Corey, “There have been plenty of times where I’ve been in the park, everyone’s listening to each other rap, and people are saying some deep stuff.  There are things friends will never say to each other in a conversation, but they put it in their music, so it’s about breaking down barriers through the music.”

Oli is passionate about working class theatre makers having their voices heard, and is grateful for the opportunity the Charlie Hartill Theatre Reserve award has given them, “I think there’s just a lot of people coming from privileged backgrounds trying to talk about the working class, and it shows in the writing, it shows in the performance, so with Rapsody, it’s raw, it’s coming from a place of authenticity, and I think The Pleasance understood that, and yes, we’re grateful for them to give us this platform, it’s good to be on this scale going up to the Fringe, definitely.”

Corey adds, “a lot of the work out there, that is anything to do the working class is not usually created by the working class, and so it’s a lot of stereotype, it’s a lot of poverty, and that’s not what we’re doing.”

“At the same time though, this is an honest depiction, we show the good, the bad and ugly, because that’s just how life is. It’s one of the ones where people come away from it, some people might hate it, some people might feel like it doesn’t really fit their political agenda, but if that’s what they feel, it is what it is, because this is the story we are telling.”

       

Corey knows that hearing rap music in a theatre production will be unusual for audiences, “sonically, a lot of people will hear rap music and just assume what the subject matter is before they actually listen to the lyrics. So we’re trying to show that whatever medium it is, whether it’s theatre, film, or whatever, rap music is storytelling in the same way.”

“I feel like we are leading by example,” says Oli, “when we eventually go on tour around the country and even at Edinburgh, we can show kids who are similar to us, this is a definite option as a career.”

Rapsody, by Oli Dunbar and Corey Weekes, is at Pleasance Courtyard Wednesday 3rd – Monday 29th August 2022 (not 16th) at 17:20

“I think there’s just a lot of people coming from privileged backgrounds trying to talk about the working class, and it shows in the writing, it shows in the performance, so with Rapsody, it’s raw, it’s coming from a place of authenticity”

       
Greg Stewart

Greg Stewart

Greg is an award-winning writer with a huge passion for theatre. He has appeared on stage, as well as having directed several plays in his native Scotland. Greg is the founder and editor of Theatre Weekly

Related Articles

Autopilot credit Mihaela Bodlovic
Edinburgh Fringe 2022

Edinburgh Review: Autopilot at Pleasance Courtyard

Oedipus Electronica Photo Credit Jo Thorne
Edinburgh Fringe 2022

Edinburgh Review: Oedipus Electronica at Pleasance Courtyard

Ben Norris credit Ryan Howard
Edinburgh Fringe 2022

Edinburgh Interview: Ben Norris on Autopilot at Pleasance Courtyard

Rapsody credit Alice Gorman
Edinburgh Fringe 2022

Edinburgh Review: Rapsody at Pleasance Courtyard

Doktor Kaboom credit Fat Yeti Photography
Edinburgh Fringe 2022

Edinburgh Review: Doktor Kaboom and The Wheel of Science!

Tamsin Hurtado Clarke Push credit The Other Richard
Edinburgh Fringe 2022

Edinburgh Interview: Tamsin Hurtado Clarke on Push at Pleasance Courtyard

Twitter Facebook Youtube Instagram

At Theatre Weekly we give theatre a new audience. You'll find our theatre news, theatre reviews and theatre interviews are written from an audience point of view. Our great value London theatre tickets will get you the best deal for your theatre tickets.
Theatre Weekly, Kemp House, 152 - 160 City Road, London EC1V 2NX
  • Join Our Community
  • Privacy Policy
  • Cookie Policy
  • Terms and Conditions
  • Contact Us
  • Advertising

Recent News

She Wolf Credit Mihaela Bodlovic

Edinburgh Review: She Wolf at Assembly Roxy

An Evening Without Kate Bush courtesy of the Company

Edinburgh Review: An Evening Without Kate Bush at Assembly George Square Gardens

© 2020 Theatre Weekly

No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • Tickets
  • Digital Theatre
  • News
    • West End
    • Off West End
    • Regional & Tours
  • Reviews
  • Interviews
  • Edinburgh Fringe 2022
    • Edinburgh News
    • Edinburgh Previews
    • Edinburgh Interviews
    • Edinburgh Reviews
  • Contact Us
    • Join us as a Reviewer

© 2020 Theatre Weekly