Sabrina Mahfouz Plays: 1

That Boy; Dry Ice; Clean; Chef; Battleface; The Love I Feel is Red; With a Little Bit of Luck; Layla's Room; Rashida; Power of Plumbing; This is How it Was

Sabrina Mahfouz

• Publisher: Methuen Drama
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN: 9781350143555
• eBook ISBN: 9781350143579
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Media & Performing Arts
• Subtopic: British Drama

Sabrina Mahfouz has been called 'theatrical dynamite' by The Independent and '[one of] our most interesting playwrights' by Lyn Gardner in The Guardian. As a recent elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, she is a playwright, poet, essayist, children's author and activist whose work explores a variety of mediums in challenging and genre-defying ways. Her first play collection brings together a unique mix of published and previously unpublished works for the stage, including a Off West End Award-winning play for children; a Fringe First award-winner; a BBC Radio & Music Best Drama award-winner and a Sky Arts Academy award-winning play. From the explosive poetic monologue play Chef to the rhythmic drive of With a Little Bit of Luck, this collection fizzes with infectious lyricism that captures Mahfouz's work for the stage in a variety of different forms, proving that contemporary theatre remains boundless in terms of its ability to spark debate and move audiences.

With a Little Bit of Luck

This dream of a project began at the Bush Theatre with Madani Younis and Omar Elerian, attempting to create a UK Garage musical set over a summer adventure with three friendships at the centre. Michaela Coel took part in the first R&D and brought some crucial, illuminating feedback to the story which made me aware that the way the script had developed was not the story I really wanted to tell. I wanted to centre on one girl at a transitional point in her life, at the time when UK Garage was at its peak, in London. Due to various scheduling reasons, the project moved over to Paines Plough, where I was able to team up with the director Stef O’Driscoll, who I’d wanted to work with for years, and she was able to read what I wrote and let me know exactly what I needed to edit to get it to where she thought I was trying to get it to, plus had an equal love of raving and music and an incredible ear for intertwining it with a story. Such a joy. I gave birth just before this went into rehearsal, so I wasn’t around much in the room, but raving along to it at the Roundhouse with 1,000 other people was definitely a career highlight.

With a Little Bit of Luck was first performed on 16 July 2015 in the Theatre Tent at Latitude Festival with the following cast and creative team:

Nadia	Seroca Davis
Vocals	Martyna Baker
Musician	Gabriel Benn
Direction	Stef O’Driscoll
Lighting	Prema Mehta
Sound	Dominic Kennedy
Costume	Grace Nicholas
Movement	Yassmin Foster
Producer	Francesca Moody
Assistant Director	Nadia Amico
Production Manager	Jayson Gray
Stage Manager	Hamish Ellis
Assistant Lighting	Martin McLachlan

1

There are three performers on stage.

One is a young woman, she is the Actor and plays multiple roles.

One is a DJ (called DJ in the text for ease), who plays a mixture of acoustic and electronic music throughout – mainly adaptations of original UK garage tracks (all of which are listed throughout).

One is a a singer (called Singer in the text for ease), who plays in support of the above and sings with the vocals from the original songs, which can also be interspersed creatively with words from this text, to emphasise particular moments. This is at the discretion of the creative team, as is the decision to have a soundscape in places where no song is indicated.

* (Bracketed italics indicate stage/musical directions)

* Normal italics indicate direct speech within the narrative

* Normal font indicates narrated narrative

(Pre-show the Singer can be singing a mix of garage songs if the audience are sitting in there.

As the lights come up, DJ and Singer go straight into a lively, recognisable but altered version of:

Summer of Love by Lonyo

As this plays, Actor is dancing around what is presumably her bedroom and getting ready – patterned clothing, big jewellery, slicked-back hair, sunglasses etc. Holding each item up, posing, sometimes singing along. Choose the lyrics from the song that seem the most interesting and relevant. The audience should want to get up and dance already.

Once Actor puts on her sunglasses, the music cuts out abruptly and she turns to the audience.)

2

Actor That song there, it’s why I’m (turns around to DJ and Singer) why we’re here.

Not just that song alone, although it’s a good one.

Lonyo, Summer of Love.

I saw some shoulders going, I know which ones of you are already in this. But for everyone else.

We are here because of garage.

UK garage music.

The music that made us dance with hope in our ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Contents
• Introduction
• That Boy
• Dry Ice
• Clean
• Chef
• Battleface
• the love i feel is red
• With a Little Bit of Luck
• Layla’s Room
• Rashida
• The Power of Plumbing
• This is How it Was
• eCopyright