Performance maker, facilitator, producer
Before the railways, there was no such thing as ‘the’ time. Villages and towns had their own local times. Time was decided by the sun, and all people had to do was look at it.
200 years later, Miranda can’t stop thinking about time.
What time it is, how long she’s got, how long she’s been doing something, how long she should have been doing it, what time she needs to wake up, how long it will take to get there, how long she’ll have to sleep, is that long enough, and how long is left?
Does it have to be this way? It hasn’t always been this way. It isn’t this way for everyone. What if she decided to stop living like this? Would life be better?
Would it be possible to live without time?
...and what is time anyway?
Featuring musings on climate change, quantum physics, the destruction of humanity and dinosaurs, this solo show sees Miranda leave the city, take to the canals, travel to a remote Scottish island and form questionable relationships with moorhens in her quest to escape time.
Touring in 2024
Australia tour dates:
1st-4th & 8th-11th February - The Jonesway Theatre, Perth
18th - 25th February - The Warehouse Theatre, Adelaide
UK tour dates:
4th April - MAST Mayflower Studios, Southampton
10th April - Colchester Arts Centre
19th April - Kegworth Village Hall with Live & Local
21st April - Irnham Hall with Live & Local
24th April - Oldham Library
25th April - The Dukes, Lancaster
"A wonderfully weird exploration of time, climate change, hubris and how humanity can do things differently"
On The Record
Accessibility
All performances on the UK tour will have:
Captioning: Thanks to our collaboration with Digital 4, all performances will be captioned
Audio description: All performances will have creatively integrated audio description (no extra tech needed!)
Audio intro: An audio described introduction to the show is available below. This introduction is for blind or visually impaired audience members, or anyone who would prefer to know a bit more about the show before they come to see it.
"Truly outstanding...Prag is clearly a gifted writer and a captivating storyteller"
Fringefeed
Creative team
Created and performed by: Miranda Prag
Produced by: Veronika Diamond
Supporting director: Anoushka Bonwick
Movement director: William Lang
Set design: Tom Mills & Miranda Prag
Lighting design: Amy Daniels
Costume design: Katie Duxbury
Composer/sound designer: Alice Gilmour
Touring & technical manager: Amy Daniels
Audio description consultant: Alice Gilmour
Graphic Design: Richhand.co.uk & Stephen Caton
Trailer: LOCARTANDFILM.COM
Photography: Joe Twigg and Paul Fuller
Outside eye support (2022 R&D): Theodora van der Beek and Sam Holley-Horseman
About the show
An Attempt to Lose Time is a solo performance exploring time and our differing relationships with it. It looks at time from varied perspectives, blending collective experiences with my own personal relationship with time. Revolving around my attempts to 'give up' time in order to escape the stresses and pressures of schedules and deadlines, it explores the idea that time is running out - both in terms of my own life but also, in environmental terms, for all of us.
The modern Westernised world is obsessed with time - or rather timekeeping - measuring and dividing it increasingly accurately. Life in cities is ‘fast-paced’ and ‘time-poor’. Corporations value efficiency and productivity, and governments espouse their economic benefits. Time is a commodity.
After five years living in the city I thought about time all the time. It became exhausting and restrictive. This project asks the question: could I live without time? Would it be possible to change my relationship with time or learn to perceive it differently? Through a series of ‘experiments’ I attempted to find out - to escape from time.
The project also explores time from varied perspectives: how different cultures perceive time; the colonial imposition of standardised global time; and the nature of time in radical quantum physics.
The show is informed by interviews with people from the communities local to my scratch performances - Camden and Bolton-le-Sands - about their own relationships with time. The narrative is shaped by my transition from living in the city to living on a canal boat in rural Lancashire and how this affected the pace of my life, and I was interested to find out how different environments influence people’s experience of time.
The result is an interconnected network of ideas, a rumination on time blending the personal and the collective, a questioning of the status quo and an invitation to see time differently.
An Attempt to Lose Time was initially developed as part of a Starting Blocks residency at Camden People's Theatre in January 2020. It has been supported by CPT, Spot On Lancashire, The Dukes Theatre, Theatre by the Lake, Rosehill Theatre and Arts Council England.
Past tour dates
15th Nov 2023 - New Adelphi Theatre, Salford
17th Nov 2023 - Fairhaven Lake Boathouse with Spot On Lancashire
18th Nov 2023 - Clitheroe Library with Spot On Lancashire
24th Nov 2023 - Amble Parish Hall with Highlights Rural Touring
25th Nov 2023 - Arnside Educational Institute with Highlights Rural Touring
5th-6th Dec 2023 - Camden People's Theatre, London
7th Dec 2023 - Tom Thumb Theatre, Margate