@troy was a new departure and one of the most exciting and demanding things I have ever done. Working together with fellow playwright (and my writing buddy) Fiona Mackie, with much encouragement from Mark Courtice at Theatre Royal Winchester and Sarah Brigham at the Point, I put in an application for an ACE grant for a collaborative writing project, which had as its goal a jointly written script and a site specific production in the Gurkha Museum, Winchester.

Collaborative writing for drama is something which does not seem to happen very often. Comedy seems to lend itself to writer pairings, and of course much of tv episodic drama is a team effort, with the final script given to a writer, but still overseen by others, but to set out to create something with another writer from start to finish is quite rare. You can read more about the writing process in our FUSE blog on  thefuse.org.uk  

First performed on March 1st at the Gurkha Museum, Winchester

Cast:

Hecuba   Annie Sanger-Davies

Andromache  Hannah Timms

Cassandra    Johanna Jolson

Helen of Sparta   Beth Cleeter

Diakonos the messenger   Colin McAllister

Chorus   Vix Hobbs,  Amber O’Connell,  Anna Carr

Lots of people are worried by audience participation, but this was very gentle and non-confrontational – everyone made bunting to greet Queen Hecuba and joined a toast to the coming victory... then the audience are asked to be realtime observers in the world of the play, and watch the tragedy of these Trojan women unfold around them.

The audience and formal setting of the McDonald Gallery are actors nine and ten in our play – there was no way of knowing how it would turn out until everyone was assembled in the room.