Add a Comment

Comment by Kaite O'Reilly on July 5, 2011 at 8:58

Excuse haste - have little time just now and have the added complication of writing on a phone rather than pc...
Maybe I've been lucky, but I have always been centrally involved in all aspects of production of my work. I have always chosen the director or had the casting vote - and that was even for my first shaky professional outing at the bush forever ago, when I was certainly that mythical (and powerless?) creature, the emerging writer. I've worked with the 'old' sherman, script Cymru, and Sherman Cymru and have always been treated with professional respect and have always chosen who directs my work - and this is in a career spanning several decades... So I'm slightly surprised by the recent comments and experiences posted up... I'm sorry there are writers who have been treated so shoddily. peraps I have been fortunate, but I have found if you argue well enough, your perspectives on something as central as who
gets the directing gig in this collaborative process that is live performance is taken on.... I love directors. They are not the enemy (not that anyone said so!) but I am disheartened by Reading on the post a sense of tension or schism between this relationship at the heart of production - director and writer. Excuse my rush - I would lime to add more anon, but wanted to throw my tuppence worth in... I have also not yet come across a 'method' director - I have only worked with generous, engaged and inventive directors who worked in a style appropriate to the script and shared vision of production.

Comment by Amy Hodge on July 5, 2011 at 8:52

I understand the temptation to just tell us your plans for the future, but it would be great if you could frame those plans in the context of what has gone before. As in; what are you going to do more of? What are you going to do less of?

Thanks Tim, and thank you Meredydd for the article an interesting read.  I’m not at a desk at all this week, so my communication is slightly sporadic.

Here’s a brief attempt to answer your question Tim particularly focusing on the writer development work of the Sherman and indeed we'll sort a space at the end of July so those who want to can meet up and chat further about it all. I can't state the artistic programme cause it has not been set in stone yet, so you'll have to wait for the first season launch I'm afraid, but its looking exciting!

There are certain writer activities that are firmly in place, which I’ll list below and as ever I’m sure more ideas and initiatives will begin and a continued dialogue with writers in all capacity is vital to this.

So with a quickish answer to your question, RAWs will continue, if I had my way there would be one a season for sure and in the long run the Sherman could commission into them (rather than as is the moment using them as a way to show work that has been developed on courses) 

The Sherman will be rolling out Spread The Word, a writer development scheme starting this autumn, for which we have a specific grant from ACW which will give the organisation a chance to take the courses we’ve been running in Cardiff for the past three years and do them across the country over the next couple of years in various places working with partner organisation – an important infrastructure to help writers based further afield than Cardiff access opportunities and so allow the company to more comprehensively fill its national new writing remit

We will continue our young writers group, which has been a great success and has worked well particularly with them writing for our youth theatre.

We will be starting another Advanced Writers group at the end of the year. This will be our second Advanced Writers group. This has seen and will again involve 7-10 writers attached to the building, as a group, for 10 months, receiving bespoke mentorship, theatre trips and detailed sessions on various areas of playwriting. It’s been incredibly successful for all involved and long may it continue!

NAD (New Artists Development scheme) will continue offering space, mentorship and in kind support to companies and individuals who are interested.

Script Slam will probably continue in some form as its remains incredibly popular with writers and audiences, and a great introduction for writers to the company

Productions and commissions will continue to bubble a way as will readings and workshops that usually happen behind closed doors to support the writer. There will be a few co-productions lined up in 2012 that will hopefully allow the company to produce more, but no promises there.

Happy to chat about a writers library, hoping there will be writers room, and of course aware of the request for there to be a place to hang out and chat which hopefully the Sherman can facilitate.

I’m sure more initiatives and activities will come, but this is where the Sherman is at right now, its all good stuff. Do have a look at the website for more info and I’ll post up a date for an open chat for those who want to come.

Comment by meredydd barker on July 5, 2011 at 5:19

Funnily enough I shared the following thoughts with Tim Price recently.

Just before my debut at Clwyd - ten years this Christmas - I was introduced to Max Stafford Clark by a mutual friend - someone who once worked at The Everyman and had jumped to Out of Joint. Over a quick coffee he kindly passed on some tips and observations. I wrote them down and have the notebook to hand. 

 "There are very, very, very few new writing directors. That is directors whose passion, whose reason for being involved with theatre, is to direct new plays written by playwrights. There are directors who direct new writing; there are directors who have the title director of new writing; there are many who devise new work so as to keep control over the project [as twere]. But there are very, very,very few new writing directors: men and women with talent for that specific aspect of theatre directing"

And-

"Directors who are in thrall to The Method have no business directing new plays. Watch out for them. There simply isn't the time. Old plays, or classics, a certain amount of ground has been covered, work done, correct assumptions made, other productions seen etc before the four week rehearsal process begins. With a new play the sequential [nonsensical? my notes aren't clear here] nature of The Method takes too much time to be of any use. The playwright deserves to have his or her work delivered properly on press night."

More later tonight. Things to do. Suffice to say I think it's high time writers felt enabled enough to have an adult chat about directors. And I think the time is now.

Comment by Greg Cullen on July 5, 2011 at 4:24

Ok, lets get back to the Sherman.

 

Back in the day, Made In Wales Stage Company, were the new writing company of Wales, it was run by directors. Script Cymru was an improvement, but again it's role could have been interpreted as "looking after writers". Now Sherman Cymru look after us. 

 

I have felt that writers have an unequal relationship to the writing companies.  We also often have a detached relationship to the business of creating theatre other than to scribe.  Theatre is a three dimensional, collaborative, art form, but very often the writer remains in a two dimensional plane, that of paper.

 

Sometimes we don't even have a say about who is to direct our work.

 

Some of us are theatre makers and work best with actors, designers, choreographers and composers. Yet we seem wedded to the lonely Romantic model of writing rather than the Renaissance model where the writer was a central part of a company (a theatre factory) creating work, often on its feet. Shakespeare did and Robert LePage does work this way and they've done ok.

 

The Sherman needs to create a more equal role for writers and to create individual processes that best suit the writer.

 

Currently our role is often individualised amongst teams of other theatre practitioners. Teams who interact in order to create the production on stage. We can easily become isolated, discarded, disregarded and considered "difficult" if we complain about the way we are being "looked after".

 

Directors and producers love to "discover" and "nurture" new talent which is great, but we can become their pet projects.  Pets aren't just for Christmas.

 

The Sherman should open its processes to writer's self-determination. That maybe a scary prospect for the script doctors who look after us, but it might help with establishing mature, healthy, writing. 

Comment by meredydd barker on July 5, 2011 at 1:29

nothing wrong with playing nicely. But I'll say it again:

The problem is we've gone off subject - The Sherman. They're being let off the hook a little here. They need to hang a little longer and be questioned a little further and deeper.

 

Comment by meredydd barker on July 5, 2011 at 0:41

You win. I've got a stitch!

 

Much obliged

Comment by Greg Cullen on July 5, 2011 at 0:38

Meredydd, That's why the Sherman should provide a place for writers to have that coffee and an archive of plays from Wales to be shared and browsed through.

 

Likewise, I've got a play to finish! So I'll race ya!

 

Good luck with yours.

 

Greg

Comment by meredydd barker on July 5, 2011 at 0:23

Greg. It's why I don't usually subscribe to forums myself because I come across as being permanently offended. I was a little but every time I press send I think to myself, 'if we were talking about this over coffee I don't think it would have reached this pitch.' Forums are very curious in that respect.

The problem is we've gone off subject - The Sherman. They're being let off the hook a little here. They need to hang a little longer and be questioned a little further and deeper. But my god I need to get on with some work, so,  someone, anyone, give them the word on the street.

Comment by Greg Cullen on July 5, 2011 at 0:09

Meredydd, this is why I don't subscribe to forums. It's so easy to offend an individual. I was attempting, apparently I failed, to make general points from the implications of your statement.

 

As for "reactionary tosh", I will defend that statement if I may, because after sixteen years working in Mid Wales and nearly the same working in Cardiff I have witnessed, not just in the Arts, but in many aspects of Welsh life, the stifling of creativity and innovation under a spurious egalitarianism which roughly goes along the lines of, "If we can't have it then you can't either because that wouldn't be fair". Try getting something for Radnorshire, that Montgomery and Brecon aren't having and you'll see what I mean. They end up cancelling each other's desire to progress something new. Capitalism constantly stifles innovation if it threatens the status quo in pretty much the same way. I detest the idea that we can only step forward when we can all step forward because this is a misreading of Socialist ethics. Instead I think society (and the Arts) works best when we are all "equally freed" to innovate. Along the way there will be failures, but also the successes that will lead us all forward eventually.  You have clarified your position and perhaps now I have clarified mine there may not be so much difference between us. 

 

It is always difficult to use terms like innovation, enterprise, individuality etc because the Tories seem to own them. I resent that very much. Those are great qualities in the Arts and in society and are all closely linked with other beautiful words like imagination and empathy. How can the Tories own those words when they announce the axing of creative writing from the school curriculum in favour of English grammar lessons?

 

I have sat in meetings where people have agreed, "That it's only fair that the same people are used again because they did a good job last time".  Whilst this can appear to be loyalty and just reward, it can sometimes, I repeat sometimes, mask a fear of trying anything really new.

 

For twenty odd years we had an infrastructure of TIE/Community Theatre companies throughout Wales and this actually drew whatever money was left after the ACW had paid for Theatr Clywd etc and there was never any cash left for bottom-up innovation and radical theatre for adults.  Whilst I mourn the loss of Theatr Powys etc, the idea of spreading funding equally "so as to be fair" was stifling new work.To me this is indeed a "pseudo egalitarianism".

 

Far from being truly egalitarian Welsh life can become beset by cliques, quangos run by the great and the good, amateurism, parochialism and professional stasis.

 

I wish to make absolutely clear that I in no way infer that you are any of the above, nor that I associate you with any of the above. I apologise for my clumsy attempt to generalise from your original point  that two productions of the same play within two years of one another was a shame when there are so many great classics to be produced.

 

I'll also add that I enjoyed both productions of Measure, particularly the Sherman's which was innovative, enterprising and highly individual. No apologies to any Tories out there for reclaiming those words from their "reactionary tosh".

Comment by meredydd barker on July 4, 2011 at 11:59

@gregcullen This may zap any hope I might have had to get advice from you about youth theatre.

 

I don't really understand Meredydd's point about Sherman and Clywd both doing Measure For Measure within two years of one another.  I really don't know of anyone who makes the journey from South Wales to Theatr Clwyd for a night out. As it happens I did because friends were in it and we were able to stay overnight for free. Otherwise it's simply out of the question. 

I'm not referring to anyone other than theatre professionals or those who take a professional interest in theatre; the people who should be going to Mold to see stuff. I only post here because it's a professional forum for writers. I did get that right, didn't I? I've already said that I may be overestimating the amount of people who travel from Cardiff to Mold to see work at Theatr Clwyd. So the amount who do go, unless there's a mate in it and/or a floor to kip on, is zero. Well, now I know. I go to see stuff all over Wales and I live in Narberth and I don't drive. And no I don't have much money. Yes I'm stranger than I thought. I talk about going to a theatre in North Wales when I really should be talking about how easy it is to get to Edinburgh.

Besides which the interpretations of what is arguably Shakespeare's most relevant play for today were very different and that can be the purpose of going to see the same play many times. 

It can be the purpose but you only saw the two different versions in Wales because friends were in the Mold production and you got free accomodation and The Sherman production was only down the road I guess. I understand completely the worth in seeing the same play many times. I understand the changes that can occur from one night to another in the same production. I just think that within Wales if a major company has done a major revival of a major play such as Measure for Measure then I'd rather the next major company two years down the line did Richard II. Or Henry VI pt 2. Those are the risks I want to see taken by the major producing houses in Wales.

In fact I also went to  see Theatre d'Complicite's version at the National and would bite someone's hand off to get the chance to direct it myself, partly because I don think Theatr Clwyd or the Sherman really got the play. Its strangely parochial to say that the Welsh can only have one version of one Classic every few years.

Yes it is strangely parochial to say that the Welsh can only have one version of one classic every few years. I'm not saying that. Let's make something clear here and if it isn't clear I'll make sure it's clear in finale. Greg, I don't think the way you think I think. At the time I believed Clwyd's production was pretty unimpeachable to be honest. So it was a surprise to me when I walked out of The Sherman production and thought it the better of the two. The doubling up opened doors I didn't think there. It's nothing to do with parochiality and everything to do with wanting to see as wide a range of classics as possible within the limited resources available. More Shakespeare from Amy Hodge please.

Whilst you're right there are many classic texts to choose from it is not desirable to have some kind of overall artistic  programming for the whole of Wales where Chris Ricketts has to phone Terry Hands, who then phones  Peter Doran etc to make sure no one is duplicating output within a agreed time frame.

Who the hell is advocating that? I'm not. It's not how theatre works. It's not how I'd want it to work. That would be impossible. It would be like asking three different planets to work from the same clock. You're like the preacher who chides the medicine man for drawing a noisy crowd, but then you try to sell them a used bike. Make your points off your own back please. I'm not a whipping boy.

God save us from another Welsh pseudo-egalitarian committee stifling spontaneity, individuality, anarchy, artistic enterprise, vision and the courage to make a decision, see it through and take responsibility for it. We had two really interesting productions of a work of genius within two years of one another and what? We moan instead of celebrate?

The first sentence of that paragraph is reactionary tosh. And I wasn't moaning, as you say we - we? - were doing. I'm just waiting to celebrate the fact that you've been given the money to put on a luminous production of Measure for Measure that will make the Clwyd and Sherman interpretations, the ones that didn't get it but were very interesting, seem so distant in our memories it will be as if they never happened.

• ‹ Previous
• 1
• …
• 104
• 105
• 106
• 107
• 108
• …
• 122
• Next ›
• Page