Writing Vox

Two months since my last blog post? Really? Busy times – busy and really exciting!

In April I was over in Milan for the opening of #SonsOfGod: Vox, the adaptation of Coriolanus that I wrote for Charioteer Theatre. I’ve been acquainted with Charioteer since I assisted on a show of theirs about eight years ago, and I was thrilled to be approached about the possibility of writing for them this time last year – even more so considering that Coriolanus is one of my favourite Shakespeare plays.

The process of creating Vox was longer and more complex than any show I’ve worked on before. The brief was quite specific, requiring me to include elements like rap music and social media and to find a treatment that would appeal to both young and fully-fledged adults, mostly non-native English speakers. I knew we would be working with the School of Cinema in Milan, so video would be integral to the piece. There was a lot to consider.

Fortunately I was allowed to be present at the auditions, so I had met the actors and got a sense of their qualities. I much prefer writing for specific actors to writing first and casting later – it means I can write for the actors’ less obvious qualities and hopefully offer them roles that will challenge and intrigue them. Sometimes I’ll see something in an actor that unlocks the character or completely changes my intention. Once I knew who would be in the production everything began to take shape – and you can see the results below.

What followed was a very generous development period, a ton of hard work from everyone involved, and a nerve-wracking flight to Italy – I’m a slightly nervous flyer at the best of times, and it turns out that flight nerves coupled with show nerves aren’t fun. But once I got there, remembered how beautiful Milan is, saw the incredible space that is the Studio Melato and watched the first performance… I won’t say I relaxed, because that’s definitely not the right word. I had a wonderful feeling of certainty that it was a good, strong show. The audience’s reaction was fantastic, so was the response from the Piccolo, and I felt truly happy with what we had made and my part in it.

I’m planning to write more about the process of writing for specific actors, about the comedown from Vox after my return to Scotland and about Unfinished Demon Play, the piece I’ve written during mentoring through  Playwrights’ Studio Scotland. I’ll get to those things, but in the meantime have some pictures from Vox (by kind permission of Trish Hamilton Photography):