In October 2017 I was lucky enough to have a play I wrote with Anna Rose James performed by York Settlement Community Players.
YSCP had started a new initiative to foster new directors, called The Direct Approach. They sent out a call for 40 minute scripts, which would be produced and performed in York at the Eagle and Child pub.
I had an idea for a murder mystery and took it to my friend Anna Rose James, herself a very accomplished writer and theatre practitioner, and we agreed to work on it together.
The story tells of a young man, who suspects the dog walkers from his local village of being murderers. Why? Well, it’s always a dog walker that finds the body…
This was the first time I’d written collaboratively for the stage with another person, and it was an interesting experience. We shared a document and bounced it between us, discussing the overarching plot and characters and taking it in turns to write scenes. Anna had ideas I would never have come up with, and hopefully vice versa!
The play was directed by Andrew Isherwood and he did a fantastic job, and the cast were absolutely superb. It’s always a bit of a wrench giving your writing to someone else to interpret but in this case the company did a brilliant job, and the play was performed to very busy houses in its three-night run.