This is a beach hut I saw on Tankerton beach yesterday. Isn’t it great?! It looks exactly how I feel: it’s up in the clouds having some time out, giving itself space to breathe. Who knows what’s going on behind the locked door?

This residency at 57a has been very special: I’ve been free to create with no limitations other than those I’ve set myself, and I feel very lucky to have been given this time and space for my work. I hope to take some of this magic back to London with me.

Both plays I’ve been working on feature unreliable narrators who’ve lost agency in their own story. Each main character goes on a journey to find their power with differing consequences and outcomes. The nature of truth and how stories get mangled to suit the powerful are important themes to both pieces,  and in a society where we’re constantly questioning the truth we are given by politicians and the media, these plays feel as important to write as ever. How can we challenge the truths we are given and the stories we tell ourselves if we don’t create stories that do that? Both lead characters are female and neither solves their problem in ways I’d recommend trying, but I hope when produced (I’m still looking for a producer for my 2 act play so please contact me if you’re interested) will inspire debate, giving there’s characters and their stories a little more power after the lights have gone down on the stage.

Check back here for updates on both projects as they evolve.

I’d like to thank everyone who’s helped me over the last 16 days in creating two exciting plays. Jennifer Lunn at Culturcated for her dramaturgy, the wonderful actors I’ve worked with and Sharon Burrell at To The Moon for continuing to update our Pinterest board ensuring my ideas for The Debra Project are current. And of course I cannot thank Katie at The Expansionists enough for giving me this residency and truly helping me expand my creativity and practice!

For the writers reading this, these are 3 essential things I’ve learnt whilst here:

1.  Just get the ideas down, figure out the order of scenes later. You’ll be surprised how you’ll instinctively add something that you think may not initially have a place, and then this random addition becomes the answer to everything.

2.  Writing scripts feels more and more like collage. If you’ve got an early scene that isn’t working, work on a later scene and you may find out what that earlier scene needs.

3.  Dialogue works best when heard read by an actor. See my note about voice recording your reading in my previous post. It’ll help you when your alone writing again.

Ok that’s felt like a long post but I’m sure you can see how inspired I’ve been at this residency. To be given the space and time to create is sacred. Give yourself that gift for whatever you enjoy doing. You’ll be amazed at the results!

From a magical 57a,

Lucy x