new playwriting

Reasons to Stay Inside opens at Melbourne Fringe

Reasons to Stay Inside has opened at the Melbourne Fringe Festival.

A departure from my usual work, this is a play for kids and families. I wanted to create a piece that I could share with my nieces and nephews. I also really wanted to tell a story about anxiety. I think this is a show I would have liked the 10 year old version of myself to see – so I knew I wasn’t alone and so I could talk about it more easily with my family. Maybe.

Reasons to Stay Inside is about Pedro who, one day, just can’t go outside. Instead, he builds a giant pillow fort. And he won’t leave it. Flora, his best friend, tries everything she can to get Pedro to come back outside. You can’t stay in your fort forever, can you?

A show for 8 to 108 year olds about irritating best friends, dancing pegacorns, pillow forts and that weird anxious feeling.

Playing at Arts House, North Melbourne Town Hall – Tuesday 22 September to Saturday 3 October (no shows Monday or Sunday) 1pm (45 minutes). Tickets available online or call 03 9660 9666.

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Directed by Prue Clark

Starring Emma Annand and Oliver Coleman

Lighting Design by Amelia Lever-Davidson

Set, Props and Costume Design by Yvetter Turnbull

Sound Design by Lachlan Millsom

Stage Management by Luke Preer

Written and Produced by Katy Warner

Dropped in Sydney

The Goods Theatre Company, based in Sydney, are presenting Dropped at the Old Fitz Theatre this December.

I am so excited about this. As a playwright I always dreamed of my work being picked up and staged in other cities – my dream has come true. I have never met the team behind this new company (although I am aware of their excellent reputation) and feel so … humbled … is that the right word for this? … I feel excited and thrilled and over the moon that Dropped is having a new life, another life, in another city with a group of talented people who will bring their own interpretations, ideas, opinions, joy, sadness, memories and hopes to the words I wrote.

I cannot wait to see it.

When: 8 – 20 December, 2015

Where: Old Fitz Theatre – 129 Dowling Street, Woolloomooloo NSW

Who: Directed by Anthony Skuse, performed by Olivia Rose and Melita Jurisic

Website: http://www.oldfitztheatre.com/dropped/

And … check out The Goods Theatre Kickstarter Campaign to help get the show off the ground …

Dropped – Closing Night

What an opportunity it has been to rework, reimagine and remount Dropped for a season at La Mama. As a playwright it is all too rare to have the chance to revisit your work; once it is out there it is done – judged, seen, over … Sure, you have some photos and a video recording (video never can quite capture theatre can it?) but the ethereal nature of theatre, particularly a show like Dropped, means once it’s gone it’s gone. Just … Like …That ….

Thankfully La Mama picked us up and we had another go at it. The Fringe Festival season was successful but now, looking back, feels like the creative development of the piece. It was where we got to “try it out” and figure out how we could all work together. We worked quickly. We worked cheaply. We were exhausted. But we got our work on and seen. Getting your work out there; that is what Fringe is all about for me.

We were happy with the Fringe season but I desperately wanted to do the show again. I felt we hadn’t finished with Dropped yet …

The beauty, and frustration, of theatre is that we can never quite have it all figured out. There will always be things I could change and alter and develop in Dropped; I could be rewriting this piece forever. Even so, having the chance to rework the piece through reflecting on that first season has been an absolute treat. Feedback from the director, actors, designers, audiences all helped in the development of the work – I am confident that the piece is stronger for it.

As the show closes tonight I have started the reflection process again: What could I do differently? What needs to be stronger? How can I make that bit more effective? What the hell am I trying to say there? And the rewrites will start again … hopefully for a final time but who knows?

I will have to leave it alone one day I am sure.

But, as Dropped closes for a second time in Melbourne, we are looking towards another “go” at it in another place at another time – not too far from now …

Watch this space!

written by warner