In 2022, the RSC launched a new initiative called the 37 Plays, which aimed to find 37 pieces of new writing which could form a new folio of work. This was in honour of the 400th anniversary of the publication of Shakespeare’s first folio, a collection of his work that would have been lost if it weren’t for this publication. Throughout 2022, the Nottingham Rebels worked on a piece called “The Community Centre”, which allowed all of us to flex our writing skills and have a go at creating something from scratch.
Unfortunately, none of the Rebels were successful in getting their play selected as one of the 37, but Nottingham Theatre Royal were given two of the winners to produce as a rehearsed reading in Autumn 2023. The first of these plays was “Momentary Masters” by Jacob Thomas. This play told the story of an astronomy club that won a competition to travel into space. The concept may seem far-fetched, but the story was grounded in characterisation, with only 5 of the 6 members allowed to go on the trip, and the characters being left with a difficult, almost impossible, decision to make. The second play was “Still Life (with Mangos)” by Ruby Kitching, which told the story of a woman who found a new lease of life thanks to a life drawing class. Unfortunately, her husband was not as impressed, and many of her friends and colleagues saw the class as seedy rather than artistic.
Both plays were performed by professional actors, and theatre producers from across the UK were invited to hear these new pieces brought to life. To support this, the Theatre Royal decided to put on several additional pieces to celebrate new writing, amateur theatre and Shakespeare’s folio. As well as “Live at Lunch” seminars from Becky Morris (talking about the history of the first folio) and Andy Barrett (talking about his work with community theatre across the world), two extracts of new writing by local writers were chosen to be presented by amateur actors. I was involved in both of these – playing very different characters!
The first of these was “Joe and Juliet”, by Chris Hendry. This play told the story of two teenagers (the titular Joe – played by me – and Juliet – played by Ama) as they embarked on their first relationship. Alongside this story is the tale of two ghosts, Herbert (played by Paul) and Badass (played by John). They both haunt benches in a graveyard that are dedicated to them. The two stories overlap when Joe and Juliet decide to spend more and more time on Herbert’s bench in order to avoid their parents.
The “rules” of this play means that the ghosts are able to influence whoever sits on their bench. Herbert whispers things in the ears of Joe and Juliet to lead them astray – which is funny at certain points, but also a little questionable at others. Herbert’s widow (played by Paula) is forced to sit on Badass’s bench, since Joe and Juliet have taken her husband’s – and thus becomes susceptible to Badass’s influence, which, in my opinion, is a much more interesting story to follow, although the consequences are never really followed through.
The second play was “Broke” by Leah Philbin, which explored the role that bailiffs play and the type of people that take those jobs. This was a very interesting concept to me, as it was something I knew very little about. Making the focus of the play the bailiffs rather than the victims also put a new spin on a subject that I haven’t really seen covered anywhere on TV or in theatre before.
I played Graham, an older bailiff who is a little stuck in his ways, and who is given the task of mentoring new starter Efa (Ama). The extract that we performed focused on Efa’s interview with Bobby (Phil) and Efa and Graham’s first morning together. It is clear that Efa is very different from all the other employees of the firm, and she has different ideas about what being a bailiff means. Graham is a little more jaded, and seems determined to destroy Efa’s rose-tinted view. Through a series of enacted scenes with various evictees (played by Ashreen and Ben), we see the true range of characters that bailiffs have to deal with – liars, violence, threats, and genuine despair or fear. It quickly becomes clear why Graham has forced himself to become so disconnected from the work he is doing. “Broke” provides an excellent insight to a world I’d never really thought about, definitely thought-provoking stuff.
The 37 Plays festival did not end there. As well as amateur production “When the world stood still“, Rebels put together a performance piece entitled “I’ve never told anyone this before”. This piece started life as a series of writing workshops run by Andy Barrett, in which we each created characters who harboured some form of secret, and improvised a monologue that started with the words “I’ve never told anyone this before.”
Over the next few months, this grew into a series of 10-15 minute monologues, each focusing on a different character who had a secret of some sort. My character’s partner was dying, and instead of stopping to help him, he’d decided to throw himself into work in an effort to distract himself from everything else.
Penny’s character had passed a homeless person in the street that she thought was an old friend, and she asked the audience for advice about whether she should get involved or not. Pete’s character was a refugee who had left his family behind when he had travelled to the UK many years before. Now he was about to come face to face with his daughter for the first time in a long time – but she didn’t know who he was. Anne’s character had recently lost her mother, who she had cared for for many years. She was secretly excited at the prospect of having a more exciting life now that she didn’t have her mother to look after. Yasmin’s character was receiving secret love notes from an admirer, but was unaware they were from her closest friend. Gavin’s character was trying to reconnect with his estranged children, using the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles as a clever metaphor to describe his relationships. And John’s character was a writer, listening to other people’s stories and writing them down for others to enjoy or learn from.
The production was a site-specific performance, so the actors were spread across Nottingham, and the audience travelled between venues, stopping to listen to each piece in turn. Yasmin was in the Theatre Royal, Anne was at Nonsuch studios, Penny and Pete were in Broadway Cinema, Gavin and John in Nottingham Contemporary and I was at Nottingham Writers Room.
At the end of the day, the audience gathered at the Writers Room to share feedback, chat with the actors and have a cup of tea. It was a hugely successful day. Since the audience travelled round in different groups, we got the opportunity to perform our monologues several times over the course of the afternoon, allowing us to refine them and change small bits that didn’t quite work for the first groups.
I also very much enjoyed the development process, creating a character from scratch, and collaborating with both Andy and Peter to create a short monologue that told a full story. It was fun sharing our works in progress with each other, and hearing the stories that the other Rebels wanted to tell. It was interesting that there was a mix of comedy, tragedy and drama within the pieces. They were all incredibly different and unique.
A wonderful project to be involved in, and I hope we do more like it in future!
Tom Morley, January 2024
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