My experience: Ali Muriel

Never has an evening of theatre so closely resembled a fireworks display. The audience were still uttering their “Ooohs” and “Aaahhs” at the last play, as the next rushed on to take its place.

Settings ranged from a Peter Andre gig to a wardrobe, a car to (seriously) the internet. The tone, language and moods varied wildly, but all suggested one thing – writers having an almost indecent amount of fun.

Which is odd, because if the audience had seen us all seven hours previously – scribbling, crumpling, counting, scribbling some more – the atmosphere smacked more of panic and self-doubt than fun and games.

But perhaps that sense of fun stemmed more from the morning of games that preceded the playwriting. Like athletes training at altitude, the morning workshop cleverly restricted us all even further – write a scene in 10 words, write a play in 25 words, etc. After all that discipline, 100 words felt more like a release than a restriction.

And did I mention the swearwords? We were limited to only two of those, apparently in response to an expletive-packed evening a few nights previously. Which raises the intriguing possibility of renaming the event “98 Words and Two C**ts” – but I don’t expect to see that followed up…

Easily one of the highlights of the event, however, was meeting the other writers. Writing can be a cursedly lonely business and writers, unlike actors, get precious few opportunities to meet up and ‘play’ (i.e. bugger about). So the energy with which everyone threw themselves into each others’ scenes was thoroughly inspiring. The sight of Nick Payne being dragged along the ground while gamely yelling “Bad dog! Sit! Staaay!” will not been soon forgotten by those who witnessed it.
And that energy was more than matched by Natasha, Ollie and the NYT actors given the task, within half an hour, of turning each of our mad ideas into compelling theatrical firecrackers. Their success could be judged by the laughter, “Oohs” and “Aaahs” of an audience having fun. Almost as much fun, in fact, as we had writing them.