Poetry PlayAct at Poetry Live

With guest poet Lynn Jenner.

Poetry PlayAct is the brainchild of Christian Jensen. Like a poetry slam, the poetry PlayAct is a competition where spoken word artists perform their original poetry and are judged by the audience.

Unlike a slam the poets are asked to incorporate costume or props into their performance.

Come prepared or get spontaneous with the props and costumes provided on the night. Aside from the addition of props and costumes, international slam rules apply: 3 mins or less per poem; original work; time starts when you start speaking.

The winner is who the audience have selected as the best theatrical performance based on three elements, which the poets are given points on; best use of props relating to the poem, best use of costume relating to the poem, best movement/sound that engages with the content of the poem.

There will be 2 rounds;
-in round 1 selected judges, from the audience, give points in the three categories.

-In the second round the 3 best acts get to perform another piece and all of the audience vote for their favourite performance.

The venue will provide a selection of costume elements/hats/wigs etc and a selection of hand props that can be used by the poets. All these costumes and props are available for all performers alike. Performers are also encouraged to bring their own costumes or props if they would rather prepare this element in advance.

MC Rachael

Open mic - Poetry PlayAct will take up the usual musician slot and first open mic section tonight. Anyone wanting to do a straight reading will still be able to read in the second open mic spot.

Koha entry.
Winner takes out half the koha.

Guest poet bio:
Lynn Jenner won the 2011 Best First Book Award for Poetry in the New Zealand Post Book Awards for her debut collection, Dear Sweet Harry, which she completed while studying for an MA at Victoria University of Wellington’s International Institute of Modern Letters. She is now working on a second book as part of a PhD there. Dear Sweet Harry was described by Hugh Roberts in his Listener review as a “simply exhilarating” poetic sequence “that weaves together scraps of found material, family history, speculation and archival research pertaining to Harry Houdini, Mata Hari, Jewish history, the author’s grandfather’s World War I experiences, Katherine Mansfield, early treatment of tuberculosis, locomotive whistle-signal codes and god knows what else into a kind of fun-house mirror-world evocation of the early 20th century”.