News

Our Box Office-based budding playwright, Simon Harvey-Williams, has finally got his script finished… So, who’s this Eddie King character, then?

When we came up with the script deadline for this August’s Eddie King’s Unforgettable Tour of the Forgotten I remember thinking, “I know what writers are like, so this time there’ll be no excuses, a deadline’s a deadline and everyone has to stick to it”. Well the deadline was last Sunday and slightly embarrassingly I’ve only just finished my script. Still, it was very satisfying moment when I typed the words ‘The End’ and emailed it off (along with a slightly apologetic message). At the moment I am pleased with the script, but I do need a couple of days away from it before I can objectively judge whether it is actually any good or not.

Eddie King has had quite a few mentions in these blogs so it’s probably a good point to explain a bit more about it. The initial spark for the first year’s show came in a rare quiet moment on the Box Office last May. I remember sitting there listening to all the different things going on within the building - acting, singing, dancing classes, and more - and thinking wouldn’t it be great to use the whole building as a performance space. After speaking about it to a writer friend the idea grew and we came up with the plan of using the whole of the theatre area as a showcase for short new plays. At that point it was just talk and when I met up with the Theatre Manager to discuss it I expected to hear all the reasons why it maybe wouldn’t be possible. But instead he was almost more enthusiastic than I was and the show was slotted in for the beginning of that August. The Eddie King character was a creation of Phil John, a foul mouthed character fuelled by his love of gin and his hatred of actors and writers (I’m talking about Eddie rather than Phil). Within a very hectic month we managed to pull Eddie King’s Non Refundable Tour of Lost Souls together and it went down amazingly well. So now we’re under a month away from the second instalment of and this year we’ve upped the ante by not just using the whole of the Tobacco Factory but also starting this year’s show over the road at The Brewery Theatre. I’m just not quite sure how we can top that next year! Also I’m amazed at some of the writers, directors and actors we’ve got involved this year; in fact the number of people involved has more than doubled from last year.

Well I’ve been staring at this computer monitor since mid morning and its now mid evening so I think it’s time for some food and a well earned glass of wine. I’ll try to switch my mind off from anything script related for the rest of the evening - although I suspect I’ll be tempted to give it one more read through.