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Introduction
Throughout the project we had many conversations as we addressed the challenges and teased out the best course of action to address them. We wanted to record and present some of these lessons in a way that captured the breadth of emotion as well as the facts of the work we achieved. To this end we decided to write a letter to others considering a similar project, our future selves.
Hello!
We hear you’re thinking of doing a cross-generational project in a local community, enabling residents to tell some of the stories of where they live. We thought you might like to hear about our experience of doing the same – the challenging, satisfying and truly wonderful (near) year we had in Braunston. A sort of dos and don’ts which is less about the bullet point facts and figures and more about what we can reflect on now that our work is practically done.
For starters – don’t attempt to do what we did! Three full productions in 9 months, with drama and writing workshops, was far too much with the time and money available. We spent way more days than we thought it would, over and above what we could pay ourselves. Remember that quality is often better than quantity. But do allow yourselves to be motivated by the people you meet, enchanted by their stories and willing to go where those stories take you.
Our starting point was a significant historical event in the village in 1923, a strike by some 50-60 boat families; however, we also wanted to find out what Braunston meant to people who live there now in the 2020s. Our community cast came from Braunston (or very local to it) – they and their children went/go to the village school, they drink in the pubs, use the shops, come from boating and non-boating families. We talked to people we bumped into in pubs and shops, interviewing them and keeping an audio recording, or just scribbling notes on backs of receipts and beer mats. Through The Bugle, Braunston’s community Facebook page we asked residents what Braunston means to them. Over again, and in different ways, people said two things about Braunston – that it was a special place that drew them to live there (or stay there all their lives) and that it was packed full of history.
Do trust in the process. The three productions we wrote were based on true events and about real people, but all started with a blank page. Characters named after those who lived and worked in Braunston in the village and on the canal. Names listed in the 1921 Census, the graveyards, newspaper reports of WI and football club meetings, and several generations later on Facebook. For a period we could have won Mastermind with a specialist round on “Braunston 1920-29”. We encouraged our budding writers to immerse themselves in local records and one of the most moving episodes of A Cut Through Time was written by one of them – an imagined account of a young woman whose boatman sweetheart died at war in 1915.
Dialogue in all three plays was often verbatim – you could almost hear the ripple when somebody in the audience recognised something they had said to us, or if a story was about their dad or Gran.
We told the story of a young woman who had represented Northants at the National School Athletics Competition 1928 and were moved to tears when her twin children, now in their eighties, introduced themselves to our young actor.
You will find it useful to refer to national sources like the British Newspaper Archive to give context to the local history you find. Records are kept by Houses of Parliament (Hansard), Cabinet papers and Trade Unions – all freely available online. Questions typed into search engines included ‘What was on the BBC in 1927’, ‘What is a Board of Guardians’ and ‘What did aprons look like in the 1920s’? Contemporary adverts give insight into consumer goods and prices (like wireless sets and the price of bacon). Not all of our research (down many rabbit holes led by curiosity) made it into the scripts. And do better than us at logging all your sources because somebody in your community might want to build on all your work. Don’t try to be historians – not the role of the writer or dramaturg. Be inspired and provoked by the material you find into creating theatre to entertain as well as invite the audience to reflect into what has changed and what is the same – then and now.
Do allow yourself a lot of time to embed yourselves in the community and build relationships. It worked well for us. We wished we had started in September, giving ourselves a run in with the school and getting a feel of the pattern of village life before we attempted to recruit participants. Being there as much as possible is a success factor but it’s also a challenge as it means you are ‘on duty’ almost all the time, and that does add to the hours. Go to events as we did – the History Society talks and AGM, the monthly Cinema Club, quiz nights in the village hall and local pub, craft fairs, church socials and the summer fete. We felt very much part of the community buying milk and stamps at the shop, chatting to the butcher’s assistant about her life on the canal before her family stepped off the boats, meeting children from the school out with their friends and families on the towpath. Get your hair cut at the hairdressers and your nails done at the beauticians (ours was a mine of information about the history of the high street), lean on the bar the pub and be a customer at the community café.
Learn that talking to everyone is invaluable, you never know which apparently irrelevant chat will lead to ‘have you met?’ or ‘My neighbour might be interested in that’. And sometimes conversations that hit a dead end reappear in another guise later down the line. A conversation about using a very small workshop at the marina resulted in the offer of a studio space – office, small kitchen, loo, ideal for rehearsal and admin work. The butcher’s daughter turned out to have studied drama, a kid in Year 4 had a big sister so good at art she produced our show poster.
Do make a record of everything – you think you will remember who said what when but you won’t. Photos are your friend – when one of you is deep in conversation with Henry in the Wheatsheaf (you will have your own Henry), make notes of course, but an image to show the different settings we worked in would have added to the depth of our evaluation.
Do stop and reflect as you go along, and don’t be afraid to pivot off in a change of direction. When we expanding our thinking of who and what would ‘fit’ into the project we increased its value. An example – we recorded interviews with people who were pupils at the school in the 1940s and 50s, outside of our timeline but they gave us such a rich insight into the village school day in times past that we could use their descriptions to give depth to a scene in A Cut Through Time. One of them was the daughter of a boat child who was at the school during the strike so her mum became a character in The Day the Boats Stopped.
Do take the time to understand the constraints of your collaborators who will have an agenda that is different to yours. A project kick-off meeting is vital sure but get to know their world and be aware of how different yours is. Then start the project proper. Be clear about what you are after then be prepared to adapt and rescale. Don’t forget to adjust your budget and time plan and be honest with yourself about what won’t then happen. We learnt all this working with the village school and sometimes it was a bumpy ride. But it was the right thing to do, the school had always been keen to take part so shaping the work to their needs was important. We think we cracked it – the Head invited us to drop in for a coffee anytime once we had finished.
Keeping everyone involved and up to date throughout is a challenge, especially when it’s a rare rehearsal that everyone is present at.
Do understand that there is a history in any community, be sensitive to age-old rivalries and issues. We had hoped to offer a trans person in the village an opportunity to reengage with the theatre group but she had already moved on, found other creative outlets. Know that above all to pack your best people person skills in your project suitcase, one size fits all won’t work. Don’t be surprised if you become a confidante, someone looked to provide solutions – a privileged position but one that needs boundaries.
Do be prepared to start with a loose concept – getting the balance in any funding bid is difficult. You need to demonstrate that you’ve thought through and planned but in reality, things change once involved with the community. Allow time in your budget for reflection, monitoring and evaluation. Be realistic about the time taken to write the final report! And don’t just build in a contingency budget, build in contingency time too – add 5% to all plans. One of our unexpected challenges was having to change bank accounts mid-project. We hope you won’t have to do this but whatever you unexpected challenge is you will have contingency time to deal with it.
Do be generous and involve other artists but be aware that with long lead times your original collaborators may not be able to stick to plans. Have a Plan B (plan C in our case with costume supervisors). Working with a wider group of artists was new for us and needed a degree of flexibility. We were offering small contracts so, unsurprisingly, some were no longer available (or moved on to other work) by the time we started the project. But in the end, we provided more work for more freelancers (several of whom were early career) than planned.
Do think about how you are going to monitor and evaluate before you start. We learnt we needed to better at this in our next project – we collected a lot of feedback but needed more time to between activities to learn from it. But don’t forget to dig in your WhatsApp and email history to remind yourself of all the small victories and hidden gems.
Do engage a mentor for your bid as well as for your delivery. Someone who can ask awkward questions because they can see the wood for the trees while you are lumbering through the briars. We were very grateful for those in Braunston who could give us perspective – ex and current local councillors, the vicar, chairs of the local groups, a volunteer with fingers in many local societies.
Do have some energy left over to enjoy yourselves, to revel in the small wins (the bellringers good heartedly cancelling practice so the audience could hear the outdoor show) the spine tingles (silence for a pin drop in the auditorium during a moving monologue delivered by a new actor), and the point you realise you have struck a chord (so many responses to our Facebook posts asking for memories).
And finally Do remember to be inspired for your next project. We know that we want to do another community based theatre project – who wouldn’t after all this learning!
With best wishes,
Joanna and Kate.
