Reflecting back and moving forward

After performing the first 17 minutes of One at First in 3 at Northern Stage on Thursday 7 March I found myself hoping that everyone else thought that went as well as I did. It wasn't perfect - that's not what Scratch is for - but I didn't cough (bloody thing kicked off 10 mins before hand) or throw up (food and drink on stage plus nerves make for a potent cocktail), which was a good start.

I got some laughs in the places I hoped for them but more importantly it felt good to be up there. I like the more live arty moments, the more dark and surreal. I like the fact that a lot of the text plays on more than one level.

Like I said, it wasn't perfect. There is a lot to be learned. I messed up on some audience interaction. I picked on the first person I saw and unfortunately she was someone who works at the venue. She was also clearly uncomfortable and in the moment I didn't do enough to help her. I could almost hear Kate Fox's voice in my ear... It was played too much to the room and was too general when some of it could have been used to really talk to people. Some of that was nerves and all of it can be learned from.

The tapes are clunky but I hope not too distracting. I still believe they are the right thing to have. They tie in to a certain nostalgia. They are imperfect and fit in with the idea that I am in control of my environment; that I have everything I need to populate my world. But I also need to be able to flip that idea and bring the audience in. I don't want to keep making the same point. 

It will be very interesting to read the feedback. To see what people saw, liked, wanted more of and no doubt some of the stuff they didn't. I hope the majority of it is as positive as I felt coming out of the show.

Lots to think about. 

A post show dissection with Ellie Harrison on Friday and I was still feeling good. I'm at a place where I feel I can stop retreading the same ground and move on. This hopefully means I can try something totally new at Transform in April, which would be riskier but more useful to me. I think I am past the making stage and can now look forward to structuring, rehearsing, molding, learning and polishing. It feels like a I am entering a new phase in the project.

An outside eye - working with Ellie Harrison

On Friday 15 February I had a very different, but no less productive, day with Ellie Harrison at The Carriageworks.

Ellie is acting as an outside eye on the show and I find her particularly helpful when it comes to thinking about the ideas and especially about the structure of the piece. We spent a lot of time pouring over the various bits of 'material', written, tried and tested, physical, musical and totally untried to get a sense of what I have. There was a lot.

Ellie asked a lot of probing questions including the hardest of all to answer; "What am I trying to say?"

She told me that I was being too harsh on myself and at the same time not hard enough... And yet, I still think maybe she was going a little easy on me. A lot of the material I have is too similar. It treads a lot of the same ground. We teased out a number of themes that play nicely together and I feel that there could be a strong 30-40 minutes in there. It was one of those days where you spend a lot of time re-arranging pieces of paper into a coherent order of sorts. And we did, for the most part, but there is still a rather large question mark over the end of the piece and consequently over my head.

What am I trying to say that I haven't already said? What is the big finish? Could that possibly be all there is to say?

I need to spend some time running in what I have and seeing if it works off the page as well it does laid out on a floor or in my head. I'm happy to say that the opening section from the very first Scratch seems to be holding strong as a nice foundation.

I'm looking forward to showing the first 20 minutes in a few weeks at First in Three at Northern Stage. I'm pretty sure that is the best test for the material. Especially if I mean what I say in the copy I wrote; I can't do it without an audience.

In the meantime, I have a photo shoot for the publicity image (and my website...) and lots to think about/try. Wish me luck.

On reflection - a review of 2012

It seems appropriate (and popular) to use the time of year to look back and reflect on the previous year. As things were a little tough in the middle/latter stages of the year for me I have been a little reluctant to do this but looking over my blog posts for 2012 I am reminded that I was involved in a great number of very positive things.

Photograph by Matt Tullett

So, and in no particular order, here are a few of them:

1. At the beginning of June I was lucky enough to be selected to be one of 24 artists to play and make work over 24 hours at Contact Theatre for 24 Arty People. Contact's offering was so completely generous - opening up their entire building for us to enjoy and offering numerous members of staff to make it easy for us to do whatever we wanted to do. It was utterly joyful and introduced me to new artists and friends.
2. In May i was selected to go to Northern Stage in Newcastle and pitch for Title Pending. I was thrilled to be invited but quickly realised when I got there that I wasn't ready. There time scale would not work for me and vice versa. However, this was the first test of my ideas for 'One' and as such it was really useful.  It was also a statement to my peers (and myself) that I am a serious, professional theatre maker and that that is the career I intend to pursue.
3. In June I also discovered I had won one of the Emerge Mentored Commissions to develop 'One' over a year. This was an important first step as it was this injection of cash and support which undoubtedly led to me being able to successfully apply for Arts Council funding over the summer.
4. October was very tough for me but when I heard about the open call for a community choir to record backing vocals for Hope and Social's new album I knew it was something I should do. I've always loved to sing. It is something I do a lot when I am alone. Also, having watched Gavin's workplace choirs I was convinced by the uplifting power of communal singing. I'd come across Hope and Social when they made Bring The Happy with Invisible Flock. They provided the music for the celebratory, raucous, party of a theatre show in 2011. The day was so open and the band created such a welcoming atmosphere. Everyone was encouraged to bring food to share and the day was full of fun. Not everything we recorded made the final edit sadly but every time I listen to the album I am uplifted, just as I was that day.
5. I'm a big believer in Devoted & Disgruntled, an event which creates a unique space for everyone with an interest in theatre to talk about anything they think is important. It's a conference without hierarchies. No key speakers. A space where artistic directors sit alongside students, where Guardian critics sit alongside administrators and everyone has a voice. I went to two this year. The annual event in London in February and the roadshow event in Leeds in October. The fact that they weren't great for me is more to do with the head space I was in than any doubts I have about these events. It's all about possibilities and BEING THERE. There aren't many other events that get all of those people in the same room at the same time, so what happens there might be a small shift in opinion or the beginning of a whole new collaboration but it is always worth making the effort for. In fact I am heading to the annual London event later this month so watch this space for a debrief...
6. In November I went to a fantastic workshop/sharing for Furnace at West Yorkshire Playhouse. Unlimited Theatre were hosting and managed to create a very open and accepting space for play. The group was very mixed and as with Devoted & Disgruntled I was very pleased to see lots of new faces (of all ages). There were early sharings of work in development and a joyfully, unruly attempt to make a group piece of theatre based on a few small rules. The conversations and joy flowed well in to the night as many of us found ourselves dancing til the wee small hours.
7. 2012 was a fantastic year for 'The Reservation'. Although Ellie and I didn't do a lot of gigs the ones we did were very well accepted and culminated in a fabulous 4 star review from Guardian critic Lyn Gardner. She followed this up with another mention in an article on the therapeutic power of theatre in releasing grief a week later and finally inclusion in an end of year round up. This article named our teeny weeny show alongside the RSC and Stan's Cafe. It's incredible to think that we made such an impression on someone who is so well regarded. I cannot express how proud I am to have made this gently affecting show. 
8. I started making my first solo show 'One'. On occasion I think I might be mad but mostly I am enjoying constructing something from scratch. playing with ideas and form, enjoying being in front of an audience again. This is something that comes from me. Perhaps this is the ultimate act of egotism but I think it is more than that. It feels like a rite of passage. That after this, whether a roaring success or a crashing failure, I will truly be able to call myself a theatre maker. It's terrifying and glorious. 2012 is where is started and its already changed a lot. 2013 is where it will come to life and I am pretty excited.

Art Is The Light At The End Of The Tunnel

Since it is Love Arts Festival at the moment, a festival looking at arts, mental health and wellbeing, it seems appropriate to come clean about what has been/is going on with me.

I think as an artist no-one will mind if I say I have been in a dark place recently. A place, like a cross between a hamster wheel and a dark tunnel, a relentless place filled with anger, despair and self-loathing. But as an artist I think many of you will understand when I say that it is mainly due to my art (and the support of friends and my incredible Mother) that I am beginning to pull myself out and feel like myself again, which just makes me even more grateful that I have made it a big part of my life.

Going to Devoted and Disgruntled, at the beginning of the month, felt like being in a war zone. It was too much all at once. Too many people, too much noise, too much choice. I wanted to be there but I wasn't, really. I spent all morning resisting the urge to run away. The pains in my chest were near constant and I felt sick. I stayed because I wanted to support the event itself. I had been looking forward to it for so long. But I was removed and I little numb and got very little out of it as a result.

Since then I've been making plans and rehearsing for One - getting my funding from Arts Council England was a massive boost, although even that felt like more pressure than I could handle, initially - I went back to High Spirits, a local choir, and I took part in an open call for community singers to be on the Hope and Social album. These were all good things (singing really is one of the most joyful things you can do) that were incredibly emotionally draining, just to find the strength to get there in the first place, but each one made me feel more like someone I actually recognised and liked. Me. 

I've been doing The Reservation again this week (more dates to come) and that has been tough. Don't get me wrong I am immensly proud of The Reservation and I want to do it but... I suppose I knew it would be tough. A 14 hour day is tough at the best of times but when you have been off work for the best part of a month it's a really BIG investment of time and energy. As soon as I was finished on day one I was overwhelmed by relief and a flood of emotions. Not because it was too much but BECAUSE IT MATTERS. I had been so afraid that I couldn't get through it and I hadn't even realised how scared I was. But I did get through it, I enjoyed it, and day two was even better. Today I have the post-performance blues, but I always get those so I'm not too worried.

I have never looked in to art therapy, I suppose I have always just naturally had that in my life without thinking about it as such, but having recently felt the specific benefits of the sanctuary of the creative brain space I can see why so many people think it is so important. According to Love Arts “One in four of us will experience a mental health problem in our lifetime”. That seems like a lot to me.

This is only one of many things I am doing to improve my own mental health, including reducing my caffeine (for the anxiety attacks), looking in to meditation and natural remedies (for the sleep issues) and most importantly talking to someone who can help. The next stage will be returning to work, which terrifies me but thanks to all this I am building up stronger defences to make it manageable at least. I have to keep reminding myself, this is just a difficult patch. I am lucky that I am not someone who suffers ongoing clinical depression. And I will, of course, be continuing with my art and doing all I can to make that the highlight of each week. To say it has kept me alive is a slight exaggeration, but only slight, and I am grateful to have had the access to it and the ability to use it. I'm sure there are many who don't.

Emerging and Re-emerging

On gaining one of the Emerge Mentored Commissions 2012

Life is very exciting and scary and full of possibilities at the moment. Having spent over a decade doing ‘proper jobs’ I am now making a commitment, to being a performance maker, the likes of which I have never made before.

In terms of my creative career I'm a little older than what most people think of as an emerging artist, which is why the Emerge Mentored Commission is so great. What the organisations involved are most interested in is genuinely helping artists to move to the next level and it's not restricted by any arbitrary age limit. In the last couple of years I have made work with other people. Last year I collaborated with Ellie Harrison to create and tour The Reservation, which was a site-specific piece co-commissioned by Emerge. Now with their support I am working towards my first solo show so this feels like a nice, natural progression.

The term emerging also feels appropriate for where I am in the process of making 'One', as I am very much still at the beginning. I’m making slow and steady progress and having a year-long scheme to support that process is going to be invaluable. Not to mention the access to other artists and people who are willing to help raise my profile. Already rehearsal space and support, in the shape of Dick Bonham, have been made available to me and with the work in progress showing on Wednesday 20 June* I get to try it out and get that all important audience reaction. The piece I am making is about solitude and the loneliness we all feel at times and how we cope but it is also about being present in a theatre space and the desire to connect so I need an audience to really test it out. At least, I think this is what it is about at the moment. I am open to the possibility that the creative process is rarely linear and that rich material is found in the tangents…

I can’t wait to see what happens next.

*I wrote this peice for the Leeds Inspired blog before I did my scratch performance, though it didn't get used which is why I am posting it here now.