July 22nd
Hard at work, running chunks of the play now, and indeed the whole play, and although I know all the lines (AND, I think, am saying them in the right order), there is still the little matter of the choreography of the crates to master – the nine wooden crates that are now playing such an integral part in the production.

When the action of the play shifts to France, I have to move them from where they have been assembled to suggest a prison cell in Richmond Castle, to create a French pier or jetty, while some evocative accordion music plays. It’s almost like doing a dance…but myself and director Ros Hutt soon realise there isn’t quite enough music in which to achieve this ‘scene-change’ … so Ros suggests ten seconds more of accordion. But the play is already a minute or two over its allotted length of 75 minutes for Edinburgh, so I say, ‘Let me try it with just five seconds more,’ – and that does seem to solve the problem. Apart from Bible and the spud.

Continue reading →

July 9th
How to suggest simply but evocatively so many different locations in my play THIS EVIL THING?  A ten feet deep pit in which a C.O. is imprisoned, a Methodist chapel, a work camp outside Aberdeen, a hospital tent, a seaside pier, the House of Commons, an English country garden, a prison cell in Richmond Castle… the list goes on…
Continue reading →