Inspiration Everywhere!

I’ve had a week dominated by inspiration this week…it’s been all over the place…but I’ll tell you about some of the highlights.

At Black Company we are devising our new play, “All I Want for Christmas,” our attempt at a romcom which is a new challenge for us.  We had a really good session on Thursday – casting was in place and we got straight on with the task of creating content for the play – storylines, moments of joy and sadness, anticipation…all the things that will make it a pleasure to both perform and watch.  One of the things I love about the process of creating a play is how much youth theatre members inspire me but also how much they are inspired.  Before the session I had actors sending me ideas about what direction we could take characters in and after the session I had so many messages – some with small ideas, some with sections of scripts.  It’s so very lovely that people are inspired enough to go away from the session and still be creating and even more that they are confident enough to share their inspiration with me.  As a consequence “All I Want for Christmas,”  is progressing more speedily and with more richness than it would do if I had to write it on my own.

My next injection of inspiration came as we did the read through for the version of “The Nutcracker” I have written and will direct for West Yorkshire Theatre Dance Centre.   It’s so good to hear the words I have written spoken by actors who even in their initial response have a sense of the character and an understanding of the story.  The play immediately took on a life of its own which is far more than the words.  This in turn inspires thoughts for me as a director of the way the play will be staged.  The read through was followed by a meeting with the choreographers who obviously are an integral part of the story telling.  The ideas flying about were brilliant, each one sparking another…such a lovely thing to be part of I’m so excited about the journey we’ll go on from this initial rehearsal to the performance in February.

Then Gold was equally as full of inspiration.  Another read through, this time of, “A Christmas Carol.”  Again I was treated to listening to my script being read by animated, expressive voices and enjoyed every minute of it.  We even got chance to start putting it up on its feet.  In a moment between run throughs I overheard a group of actors talking about what costume they would wear, how they would create their character…they were all fired up with ideas that had come to them and it was all down to being involved in the creative process of making a play.

I’m constantly astonished and gratified by the richness  of my life, a richness entirely fuelled by the magical properties of inspiration!