Patrick Maguire and Alan Anderson are part of the city’s thriving Liverpool Playwright community, a community that has had the illustrious likes of Fred Lawless (Nightmare On Lime Street, Little Scouse on the Prairie, Scouse Pacific, Hitchhikers Guide To Fazakerley), Karen Brown, Richie Grice, Donna Lesley Price, Helen Kerr (Grin Theatre) and Mike Neary pass through its doors at one time or another.
The two men may be very different in age but their love of theatre stands out as well as their upbringing in the shadow of Anfield. Patrick Maguire started writing two years ago but in that time has fast become a young writer of note. In that time he has had plays such as Madame Reprobate and 2’s Up performed for Queertet. His look at life and writing can be summed as “The art of writing is a true expression of the self”. Alan Anderson is very genial and forthcoming in his approach to theatre writing and life in general and as both men sit and discuss theatre it’s very easy to get drawn into their world. As they chat, the Write Now Festival is the over-riding issue of the day.
It does seem very exciting, the new Liverpool Playwrights festival, what are your thoughts on it?
Patrick: “It’s a really exciting time for the Playwrights and for Liverpool; we’re being a flagship for new writing for writers from the city. It’s exciting for us as writers as something that hasn’t been performed before have got an opportunity to be on a really established stage at the Unity Theatre which will be of great benefit to them just coming out of the starting gate that it is for them. For me, it’s just exciting to have my name up there with the other playwrights who are also taking part in the festival.”
What do you think new writing means to Liverpool in terms of plays and other performances?
Alan: “I saw Bon Voyage yesterday with my wife and we talked about this, there is a tradition of Liverpool humour and we wondered how much longer it was going to be with us – the earthiness, the fact that a lot of the humour was based on an industrial background and whatever and we are moving towards a more fragmented society where it’s a dormitory now, people don’t work where they live and I’m wondering whether writers today or tomorrow will be able to capture the humour and the identity of the city.”
That’s incredibly interesting, mainly because I’m not from Liverpool and I see the city as one of the most cohesive places in the country as it is so identifiable.
Alan: “As I keep saying, the writing’s on the wall!”
What are Liverpool Playwrights about?
Patrick: “I’d say we’re about giving, taking and sharing ideas and we’re all in this together to build up a new take on the identity of playwriting within the city. So this giving and sharing of ideas and creativity in plays and playwriting is a collaborative process, the real great ideas get refined through talking and being with each other so any type of conversation on a theme is fantastic for writers, directors, actors – it’s about discussions and about how we as a group and the wider groups around us like what’s happening in the city right the way through to what’s happening in Syria, we’re here to tell stories and we need people to write them and we need people to listen and that’s a two-way system.”
Liverpool is possibly the one place in the U.K. that has this ability to listen and take on new thoughts.
Alan: “You’re right but don’t forget that writers are individuals and they are in their own capsules writing independently from each other and when we get together at Liverpool Playwrights and we discuss each other’s work and help guide wherever we can, we learn separately and from each other, which is helpful.”
I’m reminded at this point of a wonderful quote – ‘writing is the closest occupation that mimics death’ and yet this turns it on it’s heard and breathes new life into writing.
Patrick: “I’d have to agree with the quote, which puts things in perspective, sometimes you look at your own work and you want to throw yourself out of a window but on the other side to that, it can give you a new lease of life, a new energy and a new way about thinking about the world around you and yourself. One of the things I’ve discovered after writing draft after draft is getting to really know what the piece is about that surprised me about myself and which affected my thoughts on the world around me and how you take it in. I feel coming from a more of a fine art background, that it’s given me a new lease of life, may be if you ask me the same question in 20 years’ time and I’ll be on tranquillisers or something (laughs). At the moment, due to Playwrights and the past two years this has been going, I’ve just found out that I’ve got on the young Everyman/Playhouse writing course and I start today in about an hour’s time and no one is going to tell me that is not something new to look forward to and a reason to be here to enjoy speaking and learning with new people. It’s a great thing so I’ve only ever found benefits as much as they could be crushing or emotional or whatever else. I’m grateful to the Playwrights, I’m grateful to art as well.”
Alan: “We pushed for regional development funds, it’s true to say. A lot of writers concentrate on competitions and try to get down that way but mostly with them you don’t get feedback from a director or producer or someone of that nature. Whereas we’ve got this process and we can overhear other people being given advice so it’s better, the benefits are multiplied, depending on the number of writers there. If you have six or eight writers talking about a piece, who knows where you will pick information up from? Even if we don’t’ think so, we tend to specialise and you know, we are safe in our own areas of knowledge and because that suits our style of writing, we get cross pollination and you know, birds of a feather!”
You’re going up to the Unity Theatre with this. How important do you think your writing is to that sort of theatre? How does your ethos on new writing reflect on that of the venue – to support new work?
Patrick: “Doesn’t it work in perfect partnership? That we’re all here working towards a very similar thing, displaying new writers in a place that has been renovated to a fantastic quality and has two great spaces in it and has a bar where you can drink! I think it goes hand in hand and it’s great for us to be there as the Unity Theatre has put on some fantastic works. I’m not suggesting that we can compete with that but I think that to be here together, putting on the plays for Write Now along with the Unity and what they have in mind all goes really well together, it can only benefit all parties.”
What can audiences expect from the amount of plays that are on over the four days?
Alan: “Our contribution differs slightly from the mainstream, in the plays that are on, we are doing four scripted hand-readings of short plays for 15 minutes and we are offering a kaleidoscope of works. The other pieces will have been more extensively worked upon by directors and actors but in our case, we held a competition within ourselves and we appointed a judge and put our works through to the judge who I honestly thought wasn’t very good as a judge ….. (mine didn’t get through!) He deserves a mention – Steve Bailey – who has turned away from writing plays and now writes children’s books so our work is this kaleidoscope of four pieces and has been refined by the process of competition and also collaborations together with the other members.”
Write Now 2013 runs at The Unity Theatre from Wednesday 18th till Saturday 21st September and The Liverpool Playwrights Script in Hand will feature works read on the day by Jane Barrow, E.J., Neil A. Edwards and Patrick Maguire.
Tickets for all shows and events can be purchased from The Unity Theatre Box office, by telephone on 0844 8732888 or online at www.unitytheatreliverpool.co.uk.
Ian D. Hall