Arran..

Am off to Arran this week to co-ordinate 'Voices of Arran'... site specific documentary exploring the Highland Clearances. Also coming with us are 15 postgraduate PGCE students to explore new narratives and creative techniques of working.
And it's been given out for snow!!

March 2010- the month of Silent Anger!

It's been a busy few months of which I've obviously not been blogging! I had a wonderful time in Porthcawl with a fantastic cast and creative team on Beauty and the Beast. See some pics here: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Coventry/Imagine-Theatre/100435475543?ref=mf#!/album.php?aid=103425&id=100435475543

So, what's new? I'm currently co-producing and on the script construction team for Silent Anger our new documentary play for touring combatting right wing views and extremism. We've been researching now for a number of weeks. It's a powerful medium documentary and verbatim theatre and, as Max Stafford Clark posits, it really does do what journalism fails too. We have to now think of how to construct and weave these various narratives together to create a compelling and dynamic drama that will be suitable for Year 10 students through to public performances also.

We had a great casting session in London, aided by actor Neil Roberts alongside myself and co-producer Julia Barton.... Normally at casting you start from the premise that the actors you will see CAN actually act; so then all the other factors then influence proceedings, such as parity, whether people would get on for 7 weeks touring and seemingly mundaine issues such as height and accent! We like to give actors at least 30 minutes at auditions as its imperative to assemble to right cast for such a specific piece. We also look for people interested in the political and social aspects of the piece... but all the actors were- such a tough day but we've a fab team in place.

So this Friday we begin with our team of script editors- myself, Dom Meir (an actor in the piece and who has undertaken most of the interviews), writer Deborah McAndrew and director Patrick Connellan. We have to find the material that will support what we want to say and sift through piles and piles of primary and secondary source material. But director Peter Cheeseman's mantra always remains true: "if there's no material, there's no scene". After Friday I imagine we will have to go away and delve deeper into research as well as interviewing more people.

The journey begins (as the designers are desperate for a script we'd better make it a speedy journey!!)