22nd January: Influence for Removed and Destroyed

My first full length play  Removed and Destroyed will go into rehearsals in April and is currently being cast. I started writing the play in 2012 it started in my head as a short play, no longer than 20 minutes and had a rather confusing sci-fi concept to do with people have memory and information download (nice thinking Phillip K Dick but I got lost in my own rules). The characters and the story developed and play evolved into what it is today. The play was developed whilst I was on the Liverpool Everyman Playhouse young writers programme, and I am forever indebted to the course and my fellows students for the play being in the state that it is today.

I knew over the coming months I'll be asked a lot about why I wrote the play, what am I trying to say  and I know that there is no simple answer to these questions.  The play was a collage of ideas, the contexts of which stuck to the back on my mind and scribbled in ink in various notebooks over a long period of time.  So in attempt to make things clearer for myself I thought I should write about some of the influences that helped shape the play. This is very self indulgence and may not be off any interest to anyone other than myself so apologies if you are reading this.

First off I should start with the obvious I love dystopian fiction, Orwell's 1984 is one my favourite books, V for Vendetta is a masterpiece (the comic book, the film was a hatchet job) and a big healthy dose Catch 22 and Kafka clearly have influenced the way I see the world.

Abu Qutada

When I began writing the debate surrounding the deportation of Abu Qatada was in full swing what angered me most about the debate was how caviler the mainstream media and politicians were when it came to idea of Qatada's human rights. The idea that because this man was dedicated to the destruction of civil liberties and human rights he was himself  not entitled to these basic rights. I found this interesting wasn't the idea that EVERYONE  was entitled regardless of what they said or did? A long with this came the arguments in the defense of torture, I remember one Sunday morning watching The Big Questions (I do not recommend this show to anyone who is easily irritated by morons) In which one man actually quoted George Orwell's Room 101 scene in an attempt to justify torture.

Theatrically speaking Dario Fo and his infamous play Accidental Death of an Anarchist were a massive influence on me, Fo's balance of black comedy, stage craft, satire and well research political observation is masterful. I first studied Fo when I was 17 and he's influenced a lot of my work both consciously and sub. You can read his noble prize speech here

Poster for a production of Fo's masterpiece

http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/1997/fo-lecture.html

Other playwrights who's work  influenced me whilst writing are Simon Stephens The Trial of Ubu Roi Martin McDonnagh, The Pillowman and Caryl Churchill Far Away

Cruel Britannia 

Ian Cobain's book Cruel Britannia was massively helpful resource for research and is an incredibly interesting read about the UK's use of torture over the last 60 years. As was Christopher Hitchens' essay on Water boarding.

The Poems If by Edward Bond and Vultures by Chinua Achebe have clearly struck accord with me, I first read them aged 18. During a rehearsed reading workshop one of the actors asked me why I had chosen to set my play in a Dystopian future Britain when there were plenty of countries around the world where this was an occurrence. I was reminded of the first line of Bond's poem

"If Auschwitz had been in Hampshire, there would have been Englishmen to guard it."


Samuel Beckett and Charlie Chaplin defiantly shaped the way I see tragedy and comedy, I think it's the mixing of the silly with the suffering that makes a truly fascinating and enjoyable night at the theatre.

“We must laugh in the face of our helplessness against the force of nature – or go insane” Charlie Chaplin 

Likewise Armando Iannucci work shows the madness and insanity behind modern politics, as does Kubrick's masterpiece Dr. Strangelove.

The War Room from Dr. Strangelove designed by Ken Adams

Somewhere between the second and third draft of the play the news about the NSA secret recording everything anyone did on the internet broke, whilst this wasn't a direct influence on the play it's a reminder of how important our human rights are when our governments now have the ability to spy on us, what protects us?

I was listening to a lot of folk music at the time of writing, Billy Bragg and Steve Earle in particular.

10th January

Today was another morning shift, which went fine, I arrived home and began work on my play for the second LABB night which is on the theme of childhood I also did the last bit of redrafting for Bondage which I'll be rehearse tomorrow.

If that wasn't enough writing I also began to work on another short play for LABB. If I'm honest I'm not a hundred percent sure off it. I had the idea of Wednesday and the deadline is tomorrow, and with rehearsals for Bondage I don't think I'll be able to get it into great shape. It's a nice idea but not one which entirely links in with the theme for the night, if it doesn't get picked I might develop it for something else if not it was a good exercise, I wrote two 3 dimensional  female characters (I've written female sketches before) which shockingly is a first for me. That's one of the great things about Writers LABB is it forces you to write towards deadlines, and gets you writing things you might not normally work towards.

I went to Pub tonight which given my decision to not drink in January was surprisingly easy I had two other friends taking part in the challenge known as Dryathalon, however one of them fell at the first hurdle (went the bar and came back with two pints of Stella). When I came back home I was excited to find out that the latest series of Always Sunny in Philadelphia, is finally on Netflix. I watched one...OK I watched two episodes before going to bed.

I also had an idea for another short comic book strip which I think would work well as a future shock short for 2000AD I've already worked on one short which I will be hopefully sending in sometime this week so I can begin work on the next one.

I think if I want to get anywhere in this industry i'll just have to keep writing.

09th January

Today was a long. Largely because I was up at 0500 hours. Why because that's the ungodly hour I have to be up for work occasionally. I coped for most of the day on a diet of coffee, oh how I love coffee. I'm totally addicted to it but as far as addictions go I think coffee is the healthiest. After I finished work, I came back home and looked over the proposal for the next ASSEMBLE, there is a great selection for the next night and I'm really excited about the company we've chosen to work with Massive Owl, but I can't announce this until Monday so check out the ASSEMBLE blog for updates.

I've also started reading Kurt Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle. I've already Slaughterhouse Five and Breakfast of Champions. I love Vonnegut's bleak humour it's like someone has looked into the abyss and laughed. His work is a reminder of just how unfair and insane the world is and just what silly little apes are capable off.

6th, 7th and 8th January

So yeah I know I made a rule that I would do this everyday but rules are made to be broken. The last few days have been fairly busy what with the deadline for Assemble, discussing actors for the next LABB event, Bondage sketch re-writes, Oonagh (my girlfriend) stealing my laptop to do her work on and everything else I've been trying to do this slipped me by.

So what have I been up to, well the deadline for the next Assemble night was today so applications have been coming in thick and fast there are some really exciting projects and me and Hannah (Woods) will make our decision tomorrow. Keep your eyes on the twitter and facebook feeds for details @AssembleNW .

Bondage is also coming together I've finished the re-writing for my sketches and hopefully there will be a cast rehearsal on Saturday.

I've also finished reading Neil Gaiman's Anansi Boys. Gaiman is one my favourite authors his latest book for adults The Ocean at the End of the Lane was my favourite book of 2013. Anansi Boys tells the story of Fat Charlie who on finding out about his estranged and rather embarrassing father has dies learns that he is in fact the Spider Trickster God Anansi, when Fat Charlie asks if his father was a God why did he not get any powers he find out they went to his brother, Spider. Tricksters are really interesting archetype they cause mischief and chaos and are normally very funny.

"Tricksters disrupt the world around them, playful, mischievous, subversive, amoral. Tricksters are a great bother to have around, but paradoxically they are also indispensable heroes of culture"

 Anansi Boys mixes humour with fantasy a delicious mix that makes this a fun and interesting look into the power of storytelling. Gaiman completely gets to grips with the paradox within the character, Spider brings chaos to Fat Charlie's world but from that Chaos comes order. It's a funny book but this humour that comes from somewhere dark, somewhere old, it's a story that Anansi would be proud off.

Tomorrow will be another busy day but I will blog about tomorrow night, I promise.

5th January

This evening I watched the latest episode of Sherlock. I love the BBC version of Sherlock, it's a wonderful reinvention that captures the spirit of of the Conan Doyle books. But I must confess I was slightly apprehensive about tonight's adventure, the trailers showed that it was going to be Sherlock being Watson's best man. Now I love the chemistry between Cumberbatch and Freeman, but part that idea almost felt like it was a sketch, where would be the great mystery that only Holmes could solve, surely he's better than folding napkins? Thankfully I was completely wrong and I feel guilty for ever doubting it.
  Cumberbatch is my favourite Sherlock but I know what you are thinking what would be your top five? Well I'm glad you asked...

1. Benedict Cumberbatch
2. Basil Rathbone
3. Peter Cushing
4. Jeremy Brett
5. Basil the great mouse detective

I love Sherlock and might start to binge on some of my favourite adventures and write about them. The other day I was given the Rathbone adventure "The House of Fear" so will give that a watch before next Sunday's episode.

January 4th 2014

Today was my first day back at work after a few days off. It was chaos, it always is. Work was tiring and after I finished up, I walked into the bright cold lights of a Tesco Express. I rummaged through the reduced to clear items, overly adventurous yogurt flavours and rotting bags of salad. Nothing that caught my imagination.
  I rang Oonagh and she told me off her plans with friends to go out in Stourbridge, which in my tired and caffeine deprived state my brain registered as Starrybridge, much to Oonagh's amusement. I like the sound of that though, Starrybridge, I began to daydream to imagine what Starrybridge is like. On Starrybridge it's always night time, not night night, twilight, a dark rich blue, and in the stars stand out like they do when I was 17 standing in a field with a can of warm Fosters in my hand, bright white dots. Starrybridge is not so much a place, it's a monument, a feet of engineering which would make Brunnel weep, a long, strong, black and white metallic bridge creeping off into the distant, a bridge between our world and some forgotten world, built by a man or a woman, or maybe something else entirely long before, anyone had dreamt up men and women, long before anyone had dreamt up us.
  Starrybridge hangs between the imagination and reality, people have crossed it, but they've never re-turned, they've never even existed, sometimes you might dream off them. I imagine that this bridge has a watcher, all the important bridges have watchers, he dresses as a gentleman would dress, all coats tails and top hats. One night perhaps something gets over the bridge, something that was never meant to cross something uncontrollable, something mysterious, something dangerous.
  "Do you have a clubcard?" Asked the bored checkout worker, and it was back to the real world.

3rd January

Busy and productive day today, the first of 2014. Most the day was spent working on  a script meeting for Bondage a new sketch show I've been working on with Tom Critch, Mark Till and Gary Lunt based around James Bond. This is obviously rich material for comedy but has also been done quite a lot before, so find original and interesting ways of exploring the material can sometimes prove to be more difficult than first imagined. However we have built up a rich bank of material over the last couple of months and now we had to be disciplined in what we were putting in.

We found the best solutions was rather than cutting whole sketches was to be brutal and cut them down in size. After a quick look in some record and book shops (I walked away with three Sandman Graphic Novels, they were on offer!)

I jumped on a train home, bagging myself a table seat, and started to type away a re-draft on my Funding Cut sketch. In a early scratch performance in Preston Emily (the new minister of defense) and Mark (M) did a fantastic job of making my frankly hammy sketch into something really exceptional, I went through and re-wrote it, now with their characters voice more clearly drawn, it still amazes me how much your writing improves when you have the input of actors, little things like the tone of their voice can add so much flavour  to a scene which can totally exceed  your own imagination. I'm  quite happy with the re-write and I'm really looking forward to what I think will be a really funny and fun night of live music and comedy. I'll keep you up to date as when I know the final details on the performance.

It also seems pretty certain that I will be going to the Edinburgh fringe this year which is very exciting. I had a quick email correspondence with Ruth (a fellow member of writers LABB) the director of my short play for LABB next night "Childhood" Tuesday 18th February

https://www.facebook.com/events/700854623272946/?fref=ts

A good start to 2014.

2nd January 2014

Today was a tough day, it was a long day, it was a day we had been expecting but when it came we were still shocked, it still hurt, and perhaps it didn't hurt me as much as it hurt others who I loved. But that didn't make the day any easier for me. Despite the day being sad the despite the day being long, tough and upsetting, it was in many ways a day to be thankful for friends and family and the love they feel for one another. A day to be proud as I sat there and watch my Dad do something I knew he found so hard, I was so proud to see him achieve it. Today, today was a tough day. 

January 1st 2014

In an attempt to become a more disciplined writer I've decided to keep a daily journal, and I am defiantly going to do it every day, even if it kills me, which it probably will do. New year means new resolutions effectively a list of things I am going to try and do and almost defiantly fail at.  Number 1 was this blog, so so far so good...

The rest are writing and career goals, I also want to move out of Cheshire and into the big city (which big city I have no idea yet). The next couple of months are going to be busy for me, Writers LABB  the Liverpool based writing group I'm a member of have their second night in February, I've written a short play for it which will be performed on February 18th. Check out our really cool website here.

www.writerslabb.com

ASSEMBLE  the Manchester based theatre collective which I'm a producer will be having it's second event in February and for more details on ASSEMBLE and how to take part check out our blog. The deadline for submissions has been moved to the 8th January.

http://assembletheatre.wordpress.com/2013/11/20/2-getting-there-a-double-bill/

I'm also in a sketch show based on James Bond called Bondage and I'll post more information about that as and when it happens.

After all that is done with I'm going to start focusing on my first full length play "Removed and Destroyed" which is going into rehearsals in April. To keep up to date with it and the company check out their website.

http://www.theliontamerstheatre.co.uk/

Last night the NYE celebrations all proved to be a bit to exciting for me as I ended up having a nap on a sofa in the early hours of the morning.

I've also decided to not drink during January in an attempt to save money, lose weight and pray I'm not dependent on the stuff.