Little Wonder Writer’s Project Rehearsal: Success!
On Sunday April 22nd we performed our six new plays from the Little Wonder Writer’s Project in front of a public audience at Moving Parts in Cité 27 (you can see a picture of us rehearsing on the right). We got a great quality recording, a wonderful audience response, and I’m deeply proud of the plays our writers created. So what happens next? And how can you listen to these creative masterpieces?
Hang on, what is Little Wonder?
Little Wonder is our new Radio Production Company. We record new and classic full cast audio radio plays, between ten and twenty minutes long, free to stream or download and then listen to on your trip to work, while putting on your makeup, or putting up a shelf. Whatever you like really. It’s a little burst of entertainment and culture, using trained voice actors (and, erm, occasionally, me), with immersive sound effects and original music. But don’t take my word for it, go click on a link and have a listen!
How do I listen?
There’s a link to the RSS feed on the right-hand side of this page – if you are on your mobile phone scroll to the bottom, click on the RSS link, and it will automatically download to your podcast app (plus future episodes).
You can also listen directly through this website. We release every play with blog commentary and discussion of what the play is about and why we recorded it, just in case you’re interested in that sort of thing.
If you’re on a computer you can subscribe (and, while you’re at it, like and leave reviews) at our soundcloud site. While you’re there, please take a moment to use the share buttons beneath the plays to show off our work to your social network. We’ve worked very hard on them, we’re very proud of the results, and who doesn’t like free theatre? Seriously, likes, reviews and shares make a big difference to us.
What is the Little Wonder Writer’s Project?
The objective of Little Wonder is both to unearth and revisit classics and, more importantly, to record new writing and promote new writers. Our writer’s project took six writers, all of whom are published and/or produced novelists, poets and/or playwrights, and challenged them to write a brand new radio short in three months.
Everybody had to start with a blank page, and then we worked together, exchanging commentary and constructive criticism, trying to push our limits and write something different and original. I was very selective about the writers I picked. They had to be good writers, but also nice people capable of giving and taking feedback. The result was a really enjoyable and unique writing experience. And, somehow, amazingly, everyone got me a play by the deadline. I’m not used to that in theatre. It was kind of confusing.
So, if it’s a radio play, why the public performance?
You really don’t know your play until you’ve heard it spoken out loud. Moving Parts is a Paris based theatre company run by Stephanie Campion that uses trained actors to read new scripts and works-in-progress to a public audience. You can check out their website HERE. After the show there is an audience Q&A, which is something of a difficult experience – but you always pick up one or two interesting ideas that improve the script.
Most important of all, you get to see an audience respond to your script at a stage where you can still burn the whole thing and start again make positive, constructive edits to improve the play. As part of the writers project, the idea was this would give all our authors the chance to hear their work in front of an audience.
What are the plays?
Non-Figurative Sculpture (Lisa Pasold)
Walking the Halls (Toby Frost)
Three Bridges (Anni Walsh)
First Officer (Keith Crawford)
Operation Semen (Oliver Warren)
Consume By Date/Month/Year (Kai Maristed)
Performed by
DAVID GASMAN, ROGER SURRIDGE
STEPHANIE CAMPION, MEAGAN LOPEZ
I’ll have a schedule for release dates for these and our other plays posted soon.
Lots of Work to Do – Here’s how you can help.
A couple of the plays are ready to go. We got quality recordings from the evening, in spite of the usual technical and what I like to call “theatrical” problems (ie. Random disasters that seem like they will ruin the whole show but somehow don’t.) A couple of the pieces need a little bit of reworking, either because of problems that became evident through the reading or because the authors are perfectionists. But between those that are recorded now and those we have scheduled to record in the next couple of months, we will have a steady release schedule of brand new plays right through Christmas (I’ll be putting that schedule up on the site soon.)
As well as recording the new pieces, there is a whole lot of work to do in order to create a proper public platform for our radio production company (and yes, lots and lots of new graphics from the wonderfully talented Owen Roberts). There will be significant renovation of this website (already underway), ready for an official launch in June when we will expand onto iTunes, Spotify and as many podcasting platforms as possible.
We’ll also be looking to start another writers project, for which we’ll need new writers. You’re best bet to get involved is first of all to come along to Moving Parts and try to get to know us through there. I’m afraid we don’t accept unsolicited scripts and we only work with brand new pieces written as part of our projects. If you’re a member of the Paris Writer’s Group and want to take part, grab me at the next meeting or pop me an email
Regardless of whether you are a prospective writer or keen listener, we will need lots of help to get going. If you want to help, please like/share/review/subscribe via the soundcloud page, and subscribe to this blog (below or to the right) to keep up to date with how things are going. Stick with us – it will be an exciting few months!
And please don’t forget to like/share/leave a review or a comment!
