Theatre trailers have a relatively short history, but eventually someone asked the question, if Film and TV shows have trailers (and get a lot of social media mileage out of them) why not theatre? It, like Film and TV, is a story shown in motion, however theatre does it live minus a screen. The challenge for theatre trailers then, and a good theatre trailer, is to not try and hide the elephant in the room – that what you are in fact advertising is something on a stage, and not a Film or TV show.
If you start shooting a theatre trailer on outdoors locations in a filmic style, then why aren’t you producing a film? Don’t hide the fact that what you are seeing is theatre, because it holds its value in it’s difference. I’m left immensely puzzled by theatre trailers disguising themselves as short films.
The most successful theatre trailer I’ve seen is for the much acclaimed War Horse in the West End, quite clearly the mechanics are on display but the emotion that is conveyed in that short amount of time is impressive paired with the fact you are left quite gobsmacked by the magic of the puppetry and sit there wondering after – how did they do that? I must go see the show.
Here is the trailer to War Horse:
And Jez Butterworth’s Jerusalem is also worthy of high praise. Although done in animation, the title cards clearly demarcate the product as a theatrical show and effectively catch the spirit of the piece.
For further comment on the place of trailers in theatre check out this article from Guardian.co.uk.
Kate Morris on behalf of Page Left
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