National Theatre Connections 2020

Plays for Young People

Mojisola Adebayo, Chris Bush, Alison Carr, John Donnelly, Vivienne Franzmann, Hattie Naylor, Andrew Muir, Frances Poet, Silva Semerciyan, Chris Thompson

• Publisher: Methuen Drama
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN:
  9781350161009
• Edition: 1
• eBook ISBN:
  9781350161016
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: British Drama
• Index: Literature

National Theatre Connections is an annual festival which brings new plays for young people to schools and youth theatres across the UK and Ireland. Commissioning exciting work from leading playwrights, the festival exposes actors aged 13-19 to the world of professional theatre-making, giving them full control of a theatrical production - from costume and set design to stage management and marketing campaigns. NT Connections have published over 150 original plays and regularly works with 500 theatre companies and 10,000 young people each year.

This anthology brings together 9 new plays by some of the UK's most prolific and current writers and artists alongside notes on each of the texts exploring performance for schools and youth groups.

Wind / Rush Generation(s) by Mojisola Adebayo
Tuesday by Alison Carr
A series of public apologies (in response to an unfortunate incident in the school lavatories) by John Donnelly
THE IT by Vivienne Franzmann
The Marxist in Heaven by Hattie Naylor
Look Up by Andrew Muir
Crusaders by Frances Poet
Witches Can't Be Burned by Silva Semerciyan
Dungeness by Chris Thompson .

This is a play about the British Isles, its past and its present. Set in a senior common room in a prominent university, a group of first-year undergraduates are troubled, not by the weight of their workload, but by a ‘noisy’ ghost. So they do what any group of self-respecting and intelligent university students would do in such a situation – they get out the Ouija board to confront their spiritual irritant and lay them to rest, only to be confronted by the full weight of Britain’s colonial past in all its gory glory.

However, if you think you know about British history, empire, slavery, economics, racism and humanity, then this play might get you to think again. As the planchette on the Ouija board skates from letter to letter at an ever-increasing breakneck speed, the students are catapulted through space and time, witnessing the injustices, incongruities and inhumanity of the past. This is a smorgasbord of genres and styles. Fusing naturalism with physical theatre, spoken word, absurdism, poetry and direct address, this is event theatre that whips along with the grace, pace and hypnotic magnetism of a hurricane.

Cast size

Minimum ensemble of 8 (with a core group of 6) or up to 30, ideally with a mixture of genders

Most suitable for ages 15+

Mojisola Adebayo BA (Hons), MA, PhD, FRSL has worked in theatre, radio and television over the past two decades, performing in over fifty productions, writing, devising and directing over thirty plays, and leading countless workshops worldwide, from Antarctica to Zimbabwe. Her publications include: Plays One: Moj of the Antarctic: An African Odyssey, Muhammad Ali and Me and Matt Henson: North Star (Oberon); Plays Two: STARS, I Stand Corrected, Oranges and Stones and The Interrogation of Sandra Bland (Oberon); the play 48 Minutes for Palestine in Theatre in Pieces (Methuen Drama); The Theatre for Development Handbook (with John Martin and Manisha Mehta, available through www.pan-arts.net); and several academic chapters. Mojisola is an Associate Artist with Pan Arts, Black Lives, Black Words and Building the Anti-Racist Classroom, a Visiting Artist at Rose Bruford College and Goldsmiths, and a Lecturer at Queen Mary, University of London. Her next play STARS will be staged in 2020/1. See www.mojisolaadebayo.co.uk for more.

With thanks to Ola Animashawun – dramaturg

Author’s Note

This is a play about the British Isles, its past and its present. It is written for all young people and youth theatres to perform, regardless of their cultural background, skin colour or gender.

Characters

There is potential for doubling of roles, as necessary. The names of the characters below are in some cases historic, in other cases symbolic, playful and/or deliberately ambiguous in terms of gender and culture. The play is partly an exploration of names, naming and calling things as they are.

David Lammy MP – a living figure, played by the entire cast, at least ten actors, preferably more, but not less than seven. The role needs a powerful collective voice.

Students

Six first-year university students doing a History degree. They are close-knit team of outsiders, aged around eighteen, but they can be played by younger actors, of any culture or gender. Names are androgynous. Some character traits are indicated below but don’t get too hung up on these. The play is driven by the story and by storytelling.

Ola, intelligent, very anxious but brave – t...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Contents
• National Theatre Connections by Kirsten Adam
• Introduction by Ola Animashawun
• Wind / Rush Generation(s) by Mojisola Adebayo
• Production Notes
• Tuesday by Alison Carr
• Production Notes
• A series of public apologies (in response to an unfortunate incident in the school lavatories) by John Donnelly
• Production Notes
• The IT by Vivienne Franzmann
• Production Notes
• The Marxist in Heaven by Hattie Naylor
• Production Notes
• Look Up by Andrew Muir
• Production Notes
• Crusaders by Frances Poet
• Production Notes
• Witches Can’t Be Burned by Silva Semerciyan
• Production Notes
• Dungeness by Chris Thompson
• Production Notes
• Production Notes on The Changing Room by Chris Bush
• The Changing Room
• Participating Companies
• Partner Theatres
• Performing Rights
• Copyrights
• National Theatre Connections Team
• Copyright