Three of our writers — Steve Hennessy, Mark Breckon and Tim Massey — have been selected for Theatre West’s Inside Out season at the Alma Tavern Theatre (full details on Theatre West’s website) and we’re going to see all three of their plays (Tim’s in November). All other meetings take place in the Macready Room at the Bristol Old Vic. Everyone attending pays £1.

Tuesday, 19 September at 7.30pm: Still by Steve Lambert
Steve’s new stage play. Two strangers. A river on a summer’s night. An act of seduction. Years later, they return to the same spot for what will be their final moments together.

Tuesday, 26 September at 8.30pm: The Inhabitants of the Moon are Noses by Steve Hennessy
A group visit to the Alma Tavern Theatre to see Theatre West’s production of Steve Hennessy’s latest play. The great Russian writer Nikolai Gogol lived a life as fantastical as his fiction. But where is the line between imagination and madness? And do noses really live on the moon? Hurry — there’s only an hour to turn Gogol’s famous overcoat inside out and see how a creative genius is stitched together!

Tuesday, 3 October at 7.30pm: Open Workshop
Tonight’s meeting will start with a short presentation by Annette Stenhouse from the Voluntary Arts Council.

Tuesday, 10 October at 8.30pm: The Keith Ashton Experience by Mark Breckon
Another group visit to the Alma Tavern Theatre, this time to see Theatre West’s production of Mark Breckon’s new play. Keith Ashton is no ordinary guru. Banned in Battersea and currently subject to a court injunction, these nights at the Alma will be his last for some time. But for two weeks only Keith invites you to experience the evening everyone is talking about.

Tuesday, 17 October at 7.30pm: Five-minute Script for BBC Radio Bristol
Bring along your five-minute radio dramas (or six episodes of a 30-minute drama), preferably on a local theme, for the anticipated slot on BBC Radio Bristol.

Tuesday, 24 October at 7.30pm: Open Workshop

 

Inside Out script-in-hand performances
We’re delighted to say that in addition to Steve Hennesy, Mark Breckon and Tim Massey’s success in Theatre West’s Inside Out season at the Alma Tavern, two more Southwest Scriptwriters were runners-up — and their scripts will be given rehearsed script-in-hand performance at the Alma as follows:

Sunday, 19 November at 5pm: Cowboys and Campers by Shiona Morton
Outdoor girl Wilma and line-dancing Bill have absolutely nothing in common. Oh, except country music. Can Dolly and Kenny weave their magic lovin’ spell? Will Wilma see the beauty in Bill’s fringed Cuban heels and can Bill bear to wear Wilma’s woolly walking socks?

Monday, 20 November at 9pm: Touch by Steve Lambert
A young woman who falls victim to a predatory couple finds herself in a place of absolute darkness. Yet this isn’t a story of good exposed to evil, but what happens when evil is exposed to good.

 

Practice to Deceive at Backwell Playhouse
Lesley Bown and Ann Gawthorpe’s one-act play, Practice to Deceive, is being performed in a double-bill with David Mepsted’s Blue All the Way to the End by the Backwell Players at the Backwell Playhouse on Friday, 22 and Saturday, 23 September, at 8pm. Fun all the way! Don’t miss it!

 

Unsolicited Scripts for the Finborough
For a six month trial period ending this October, London’s Finborough Theatre is accepting unsolicited submissions. The kind of work the Finborough is interested in is:

  • New writing on political, social and cultural issues
  • Music theatre (please provide a CD and allow longer for us to review it)
  • Plays about the local area, local history or personalities
  • Plays in Celtic languages or on Celtic themes
  • Adaptations of obscure books written after 1850
  • We unfortunately do not have an audience for children’s plays
  • We welcome big ambitious plays and have no problem with plays with large casts
  • We are particularly looking for “theatrical” plays — not work better suited for film, radio or TV

 
In addition to your script, you’re asked to provide a one-page synopsis, an SAE for a reply and/or return of your script — and a short writing CV — even if this is your first play. Successful writers will be contacted for a meeting, with a view to developing their script over a period of time. There is no guarantee of production.

Finborough Theatre