Love Letters Straight From Your Heart // Projects

Recent Performance

25th February 2023 7pm

Wickham Theatre, University of Bristol.

SOLD OUT!

Uninvited Guests revive the in-person version of their popular show Love Letters Straight From Your Heart to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the company and the 75th anniversary of University of Bristol's Department of Theatre, where two members of the company studied.

Love Letters Straight From Your Heart is an intimate participatory event in which audience and performers offer dedications and declarations of love, past and present. It shifts between theatre and a real social event; dedications are spoken, toasts are made, speeches are given, songs are sung, dances danced, of behalf of the audience and with them.

Before the show, people who book tickets are invited to send in music requests, to write dedications to those they love or care about, and these are worked into the event, which is different each night.

For this performance, dedications will be invited that relate to memories of the company's work or to people's time at Bristol, relationships or friendships formed whilst studying in the Department of Theatre. We try, with care, to only speak the words written by those in the audience - each performance is unique to that group of people, their memories, their current and past loves or friendships, their emotions, laid bare for everyone to witness, acknowledge and support.

Additional Information

The show is part of a day of celebrating the department's contribution to contemporary performance practice, which also includes a new work by Bodies in Flight, Unbox me!, at 4pm.

Love Letters Straight From Your Heart will be accompanied by a presentation to mark Uninvited Guests' anniversary, to reflect on the last 25 years and look forward to future projects, relationships or friendships formed whilst studying in the Department of Theatre.

This is the first in-person performance of Love Letters Straight From Your Heart since the COVID lockdowns, in response to which we made Love Letters at Home, which went on a virtual international 'tour' including BAM New York, La Teatreria Mexico City and Arts Centre Melbourne.

Watch our trailer here.

Originally a BAC Scratch and an Arnolfini We Live Here commission. Also commissioned by Leeds Met Studio Theatre, and funded by Arts Council England.

***** The Guardian "You can't help but fall in love with it."

"The most powerful theatrical event I saw." The Financial Times on Love Letters at Latitude

Love Letters Straight From Your Heart is produced by FUEL

History

Since its creation in 2007, Love Letters Straight From Your Heart has toured regularly. In 2009, we performed the show at the Edinburgh Fringe to great critical success, including a 5-star review in the Guardian. It has played to over 30 venues, with an audience of over 1,500, including two runs at the Southbank Centre, at the RSC in Stratford, and Fierce Festival.

In 2014, we toured to venues in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland in partnership with Luminate, Scotland's creative ageing festival. We visited arts centres outside the central belt and engaged older audiences in pre-show workshops, helping them write the personal dedications to loved ones that make up the show.

After the 2014 tour, we adapted the show to the Welsh language to be performed in six venues in North Wales with the company Bara Caws. We identified that the way in which the show merges theatre with a social event makes it accessible to a wider audience and have sought opportunities to tour the show to daycare centres for elders, and within rural touring schemes.

We have toured the show to village halls in North Devon, Surrey and Shropshire, and to care homes for older people in Islington, Tower Hamlets and Hammersmith in London, and ARC's Silver scheme in Stockton.

In 2020 and 2021, Love Letters Straight From Your Heart was adapted into Love Letters at Home on Zoom, connecting people socially at the height of the pandemic, when they were physically distant. As well as being programmed internationally, Love Letters at Home was hosted by 15 UK venues, including those at the heart of local communities, like Slung Low's The Holbeck in Leeds and First Art in Derbyshire, and a Welsh language version was developed with Bara Caws.

Audience feedback

I just wanted to send you an e-mail to say that I saw your show on Saturday evening at the NRLA and I thought it was amazing! The best thing I saw there. It really touched me and I haven't stopped thinking about it since. I hope I'll get the opportunity to see it or some of your other work again soon.

I loved it, I loved it, I cried, I was seduced, I fell in love again, I drank cava and said I wouldn't. I want to say thank you for that wonderful performance. I think this show is the one to build bridges and mend hearts. Thank you.

Well, thank the lord for Uninvited Guests. They made my trip to Glasgow worth it. What a marvellous, open-hearted, joyful piece of theatre.

Reviews

• Time Out Feature 2012
• Caroulsel of Fantasies and Culture Wars, Feb 2012
• Time Out Review, Edinburgh 2009
• Independent On Sunday Review
• Lyn Gardner's Guardian Review, Edinburgh 2009
• What's On Stage, Edinburgh 2009
• Broadway Baby, Edinburgh 2009
• Telegraph Blog
• Writing From Live Art, 9 February 2008, review by Tim Attack
• The Skinny Blog, 20 July 2009
• Financial Times, 25 July 2009
• Fringe Review, Latitude 2009