Going back to the text…
One of the things I love about the arts industry is just how varied and changeable your career can be at times. It’s one of those paths that keeps you constantly on your toes, adapting to meet whatever new challenge comes your way. These last few weeks, I have been on projects that fixate on ‘going back to the text’, so to speak. First, with Central Youth Theatre, touring workshops of ‘An Inspector Calls’ and ‘A Christmas Carol’ to GCSE students approaching their exams. Second, at the Arena Theatre in Wolverhampton, taking part in a script-in-hand reading of a new play, ‘Shiny Shoes and Lipstick’ by Jan Barker. And finally, spending a couple of hours of each day working on three new scripts I’m writing.
For those who are unfamiliar with the phrase, ‘going back to the text’ refers to the analytical process that actors, directors and various creatives go through in order to illuminate the writer’s intent or the dormant clues that sit within the script. When I was first properly introduced to the elements of this at drama school, it really did blow my mind. In my dramatic attempts prior to that, I had always been working off a hunch, using instinct and only instinct as my guide to what I created- but after that, the tool was indispensable to me. Everything I worked on at ALRA had it’s basis for me in the text and I was amazed at what I would find- how subtle some of these hints are. Without it, I would never have been able to plot out the full character arc of Reverend Hale in The Crucible or discover the conflict within a suffragette’s husband in a scene from Her Naked Skin.
The pieces I’ve been working on the past few weeks are exceptionally detailed; especially An Inspector Calls. I remember that I worked on the play myself early on in high school but I couldn’t remember just how juicy the whole thing is. For a modern audience of young people, that play is full of issues that are rearing their head again today in the modern world. On the one hand, it can be discouraging because, despite the process we had following the second world war, it feels as though we’re heading for a crueler society again; but on the other, it’s so encouraging to see an entire generation of young people who care about these issues and want to see the world progress to a fairer, more compassionate age. It’s a real beacon of hope to know that the debate is not lost and that maybe the misery of Eva Smith is not destined to continue down the generations.