Flight 48
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M2F90ez4NOQ
Check out the link above to see Dave Rafique’s film about Douglas Cairns’ record breaking flight around the US. This was a great little project I blogged about a while ago that I worked on with Dougie and Dave a few months ago in London.
I’m currently staying at the Katherine Susanna Pritchard (KSP) Writer’s centre up in Greenmount trying to get as much of my PhD written as possible. Its such a fantastic place for a writer to be and I encourage anybody who wants to get some serious work done in supportive surroundings to go and stay there. Or even just go and check it out, its a fantastic writer’s hub in hills of Perth. Last night I joined The Thursday night group, one of the many writers groups that convene there and got to read some work and hear the work of others. It was very cool!
Road trip to Northam
Last month I had the joy of seeing one of my plays, The Same Paige, performed by Link Theatre in Northam as part of a night of one-act comedies called Short n Curly. They have a really good set-up in Northam, Link has converted a church into a gorgeous little theatre and they have some really talented and committed artists there. The Same Paige was on after two short plays by Alan Ayckbourne. It was a really good production and I really enjoyed seeing the choices the director, Rhonda Oliver, and the actors made. They had given so much thought to the text and the characters and I was really impressed. The audience response was really positive. I surprised the cast by popping up at the end of the show and saying hi and it was so much fun to meet them all. Here is an article in the local paper about it.
http://www.avonadvocate.com.au/news/local/news/general/cast-surprised-by-play-author/1632438.aspx
Thanks to everyone at Link Theatre and to Alan Payne and Iain Dawson for convincing me I should make the road trip to Northam…
The Same Paige
Yo!
Hope you’re all well out there in cyberspace. This year I registered a couple of my plays at the Australian Script Centre. If you don’t know, this is a great place online where you can lodge your scripts and then production companies have access to them if they a looking to find a play to produce. This is really a great Aussie resource to promote our plays and playwrights. Check it out if you haven’t already http://www.ozscript.org/index.php
So since I did this ‘The Same Paige’ my short absurd comedy set in a women’s writer’s group has been picked up by not one but two companies and the really spooky/cool thing is that both productions are on this weekend. One on 18th September as part of the Riverland Youth Arts Festival in Renmark, South Australia http://www.ryt.org.au/projects/Playfest_09.aspx
And one as a night of three short plays on 17th, 18th and 19th September by Link Theatre in Northam.
If you’re around either of these places go check it out!
That makes four productions of ‘The Same Paige’ in one year, two in London and two in Australia. Pretty cool I reckon.
Anna x
‘Shift’ Asia Pacific Winner in the BBC World Service International Radio Play Competition
I am currently in cold Perth waiting to sort out my visa to come back to London for a bit. I am missing London immensely but using the time over here to work on my PhD which has been neglected over the last few months due to all the theatre work I’ve been immersed in in London.
I got some good news last week. My play ‘Shift’ has been awarded runner up and Asia Pacific Regional winner in the BBC World Service International Radio Play Competition. It’s a play set in a psychiatric hospital that was inspired by my previous work as a psychologist at Cumberland Hospital in Sydney’s Western Suburbs. It has never been produced which is fantastic, otherwise it wouldn’t have been eligible and I adapted it to radio specifically and just in time for the competition
Here are some links to the press releases,
http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/arts/2009/08/090811_radioplay_2008_winners.shtml
http://www.mnilive.com/2009/08/bbc-world-service-announces-winners-of-2009-playwriting-competition/
Been a while…
Well its been some time since I blogged. Delusion of Doubt went really well last month at The New End Theatre, though the live review was a bit disappointing. The reviewer seemed underwhelmed by the show, though he was very complimentary about Aonghus and Michael’s performances which were stunning on the night. But from what he said it seemed that he missed the actual point of the play. That was a shame, but hopefully we’ll get to put it on again sometime. I used some of Ed’s music for the show which was really perfect. Thank you Edwin of many talents!
More recently I have been helping my friend Dougie Cairns make a short film/clip about his record breaking fundraising flight around the US. Check out his website http://www.diabetesflight48.com/ I wrote a short script for the clip and helped the incredibly talented cinematographer, David Rafique with logistics for the shoot. It is in post-production at the moment, so I will let you know how it all turns out in future posts.
Right now we are preparing for a re-mount of The Same Paige (half hour version) at a pub this coming Sunday 5th July. We are staging it as a fundraiser for the gorgeous Aine Smith who plays Star in The Same Paige to get to study drama at Le Coq in Paris. For anyone familiar with the social commetary/comedy I did up in Bangkok at About Poetry, I will be doing something very similar this Sunday with the lovely Liz Garland who is a wonderful comic with a beautiful singing voice. There is also going to be live music and charity (spoof) auction and all sorts of antics so I can’t wait!
Delusion of Doubt
Well looks like I may have finally finalised casting for my next show Delusion of Doubt which is on as part of Lost Theatre’s 25th Anuual One-Act Festival at the New End Theatre in Hampstead. My show goes up on 12th May along with two other shows. Over 100 scripts were entered and Delusion of Doubt, which is about obsessive compulsive disorder was one of 30 selected to go into production. I have some great actors cast including Aonghus Weber and Tania Kureishi who were stunning in The Same Paige and Denise Stephenson who I was blessed to have cast in The Museum. Each night there is a live review of the shows which sounds slightly nerve racking but hey, it’ll be a blast!
From Writer to Director…
Well its been a while since I blogged as things have been SO busy since The Same Paige went up in the Sit Com Trials at Leicester Square Theatre on 11th March. Show went really well but surprisingly we didn’t get through to the next round. I say surprisingly because the audience seemed to really love it (and in fact we won the audience vote). But to the judges it didn’t have legs so that was a bit of a bummer. I didn’t have a chance to dwell on the disappointment however as the producers encouraged me to direct another show that went up on 18th March, The Museum by Chrissie Bullock. A great surreal script which I love. Unfortunately tight time schedule (we only had 2.5 days rehearsal) meant some compromises had to be made and I don’t think the show saw its full potential, but I’m hoping that Chris and I will work together on it in some capacity in the future. So my transformation from Sit Com writer to director has now gone full circle with me not only directing my own, but also someone else’s show. Its been a blast and I thank Simon and Declan (producers) for the opportunity to be part of this great phenomenon which is the Sit Com Trials.
Writer as Director
Well I am now directing my show for the sitcom trials and it is so much fun. I have this great British cast for The Same Paige. I never thought I could get a cast as wonderful as the one I had in Perth but it seems I have, so it is all just so exciting. Most of them are friends from the London Actors Centre where I spend a lot of time doing classes and arranging to meet people at the Two Brewers (pub around the corner). We are up in three weeks and had our first rehearsal on Saturday. It is interesting that people say writers shouldn’t direct their own work, but try as I might, I never seem to be in the position to be able to sit back and watch a show I have written (I am always either directing or acting in it) I think sometimes your vision as the writer is the right one for a show… Wish us luck!
The Sitcom Trials
Well I’m back in London now and gearing up for the Sitcom Trials (http://www.sitcomtrials.co.uk/). This is a competition I entered with my comic script “The Same Paige”. It was selected out of around 500 entries to be performed in Leicester Square Theatre along with another 31. Four plays are staged each night judged by the audience and a celebrity and the winning two plays get to go into the next round. I have just lost my director unfortunately but have a great cast just about finalised and am very excited about it all. Will write more when rehearsals start.
Beneath Our Skins
Well unfortunately we didn’t win the British Short Screenplay comp. However I am still completely psyched that we got into the final 14 given that there were around 1500 entries from all over the world.
At the moment I am getting set to head back to London but have been having lots of fun in Perth with Ed, Phil and Anna Brockway shooting scenes for Women of Various Ages and recording voice for Shivering Geoff.
One of my short stories Beneath Our Skins was published last month in that great Aussie journal Overland. Check it out,
