This a Guest Post by Sarah Wallis (@WordWeave); aka, my better half.
‘Snowgoose Writers, (Bradford branch of Script Yorkshire) are running a New Writing Festival in April 2011 we’re taking over Bradford Playhouse for a week.’ So announced our illustrious leader, Jonathan Hall, last August.
‘And I’m going to need some scripts,’ he added.
A great deal of thinking later some hazy thoughts form around the idea of the Mexican proverb two men, one woman, trouble. So we need three characters. Three should be manageable. Can probably get hold of three actors. Oh, and a director. So I’m typing out some ideas, bits of dialogue and then something starts to work and I realise I need a fourth character. It’s going to make casting a bit more difficult but I have to serve the story and keep going.
Around twenty messy pages later, a lazy idea occurs to me. What about a repeating pattern? Like the film Groundhog Day? Or the X-files version, Monday? (Which at least proves the idea is workable more than once). I’ve been thinking a lot about structure and doing something a bit different in the telling of story. My plays so far have been linear naturalism, concentrating on character. Here I am not going to have much time to spend with the characters so I make them archetypes, rounded figures with histories and interests that work against their actions. And it gets stranger and funnier than I could have envisioned for a lazy idea, which suddenly requires a lot of work. It requires checking the repeats, fast forwards and the rewinds and implementing changes to make sense of the world of the play.
Six weeks later I have a script called Mexican Proverbs. The characters that sprang up along the journey and gained personality traits have become interesting in that period where you’re so close to the script it’s hard to tell what’s going on in the bigger picture and there’s no time for any reflection because the deadlines up – it has to be submitted or I have no chance to have a play on at the festival.
Then we all wait for the decision from the two hand picked directors as to whether we will get full productions or script in hand rehearsed readings. The decision comes and I get a script in hand reading, which is okay because I’ll be free to work on the script some more and send it out again elsewhere.
I’d had a reading of a short play, Meltwater, at Leeds Carriageworks directed by Lizi Patch so I approached her to direct. She agreed and began casting. However, logistically it was impossible for Lizi to continue, so she had to drop out and so did one of the actors already cast. But Chris Clarkson (@MrChrisClarkson), cast as Jonny, decided to remain with the team, which at that point was just the two of us. After many emails, approaches and postings on West Yorkshire Theatre Network we start to attract some interest. The script is requested and dates drawn up for rehearsals.
Then Lucy Meredith (@Lulovesglitter) joined us to play Astrid. We finally had a director, Sarah Applewhite, which made us feel we were really getting somewhere. Claire Eden was next to join us to play Sonya and so we just needed a Blake. Chris suggested a friend, Scott Clarke (@scottyclown), who he’d worked with before. Scott agreed to be involved and we were finally fully cast the week before going into rehearsal.
The first rehearsal was really exciting, it always is the first time someone else speaks the lines you’ve written and only previously heard in your mind. The thing that struck me was how funny it was, I didn’t hear that at all when I was so close to the script but it was coming out now in the first rehearsal. Some oaty crunchies (made by @nalsa) and coffee broke the ice and we prepared to settle into a second reading.
Except our director had other ideas. She wanted to do an exercise where the actors would tell a story in a minute, then thirty seconds and then fifteen seconds and finally in five seconds using five poses from the story they’d told. They chose Goldilocks and The Three Bears and as the telling got quicker and quicker it was very funny, demonstrating that telling stories in this fashion can be naturally funny.
Next the actors rehearsed the choreography of the set pieces; coming up with moves they can repeat as visual clues for the audience. We thought there could be a ‘hang on we’ve heard this before, oh wait a minute it’s different’ thought process going on and taking attention away from what is happening on stage, so the visual clues will act as shorthand.
We get one more rehearsal, a marathon run on the day of the technical rehearsal next week and then we’re on, Friday 15th. I’m hoping this scarily short lead in will give the show a ton of energy and I know the talented cast are more than up to the task. I hope you’ll come and see what we’ve been working on and enjoy the show.
Mexican Proverbs by Sarah Wallis (@WordWeave) is on at Bradford Playhouse Studio 15th April at 7.30 pm.
The New Writing Festival at Bradford Playhouse runs from 13th-16th April presenting nine new plays over four days on the main stage and in the studio.
Call the Box Office on 01274 820666 to reserve tickets.