I received the news this morning that Noel Greig had passed away. Many people of my generation and older will know Noel as a significant writer and director, who changed British Theatre, and perhaps British society, when he founded the hugely influential theatre company Gay Sweatshop in the 1970s. In later years Noel became known for his extraordinary work as a teacher. His playwriting workshops were the stuff of legend, and his book 'Playwriting', published by Routledge in 2005 is one of the most effective ever guides to actually getting a play started and finished. Get hold of a copy if you can, open any page and do what it says. Your day will be brighter whether or not you ever want to write a play, and if you are a playwright, your writing will have shifted forward in some small way.
I got to know Noel, however, when he and director Kully Thiarai came to me during my first year as Artistic Director at Contact Theatre in Manchester. They had an idea for an international exchange between a Manchester youth theatre and a group they had met in India. The idea of the link was nice, but what was really interesting was the method they proposed for the exchange between the two groups: a long-distance back and forth of objects, ideas, postcards (we soon added email, though Noel was one of the great email resistors - he loved the character and craft of handwriting). The idea was that each group would be transformed by what they learned from and exchanged with the other group, but that instead of coming up with one of those 'world in harmony' performances by a multi-cultural, multi-national joint company, each of the two groups would develop their own performance based on the exchange. Many elements might end up the same - characters, incidents, maybe even story; but the pieces would also be entirely different because the groups and their lives would be different. Instead of fake harmony we would have complexity, creative surprises, and transformation. Big words, but those were the kind of values Noel talked about as though they were the stuff of our daily diet.
By the end of the meeting we had committed to the idea of a project involving twelve companies of young theatre makers, from twelve different cities across the world, each paired with a twin from another country to undertake this challenging and possibly crazy, creative exchange. The whole project would end up with a week long festival at Contact, where all the shows would be performed, all the groups would run workshops for each other, and there would be parties every night. We had no money for the project, and no idea who might want to get involved, but we were doing it! At the end of the meeting I wasn't sure whether I'd been inspired or gone insane, but I knew that I'd just been encouraged to dream by one of the most extraordinary men I had ever met, and that his presence on this unlikely journey would be a source of great security and joy.
The project became known as 'Contacting the World' and in years to come young people from countries as far and wide as Zambia, Malaysia, Brazil, Rwanda, Nepal, Turkey, Poland, Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, South Africa, the Phillipines, the United States, and many many more places in the UK and worldwide, including Wales's Sherman Youth Theatre, would come to know Noel as the 'Father of Contacting the World'. His work on the project ranged from creative guidance for companies, to mentoring of artists, to patiently guiding me and many others towards the best possible version of Contacting the World. I have an multi-layered memory of him sitting in the cafe in festival after festival, long arms and nicotine-stained fingers waving in the air like over excited windmill sails as he responded with ever-fresh excitement to the ideas and ideals of the young artists surrounding him. And other memories of him sitting almost unnoticeably in a corner with a young person who was worried, or a bit lost, or overwhelmed by the world, Noel nodding and gently humming in his throat as he listened to his new friend in a way that made listening an act of guidance.
Last year Noel published a book on Contacting the World and its techniques, again with Routledge: 'Young People, New Theatre'. The title sums up his values, and his impact on our world.
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