Big Break…

The truth is, of course, it probably won’t be a big break at all. The last time I planned to stop playing pool, snooker or any other cue sport for any length of time I went stir crazy after four months and was back playing in a money league after six. As much as I sometimes wish otherwise, it would seem potting balls on a baize of any description is something of an addiction, but it’s also one off those meditative, relaxing practises I need to keep my equilibrium.

The masterplan to take a year out at the end of the season is already gathering pace, though, and in my head it’s like I’ve almost made the leap, which is when, of course, I’ve started playing some good stuff and have started to enjoy playing competitively again.

But I need the break. I have a play on next year and it’s important I put everything I can into making it work so that it’s not only artistically and personally satisfying but so that it also leads somewhere in terms of commercial success, whether that’s getting it staged at a bigger theatre or using it as a platform to tout my writing skills and land writing gigs elsewhere.

On my theatre CV I have a huge amount of artistically credible work as a writer, director and producer: Fringe theatre plays on political and feminist issues, a large-scale community play in Docktown, a community musical in Elvis: The Howden Years, a theatre-in-education tour on domestic violence, a play commissioned by a London health authority on care in the community, the latest show about The Forgiveness Project… And I’m proud of that work because it suggests a continuity of commitment to good causes and a socially responsible and responsive theatre practice.

The one thing I’ve never done, though, is to sit back and take a really businesslike approach to my theatre work and think: How I do make this go somewhere else that will directly benefit me?

So the answer I’ve come up with is to put a comedy on that I’m currently writing with an eye on box office success. I also want to direct this or at least co-direct it and I’m going to run it like a business so I want it to make money and I also want it to have a life after that and be taken on elsewhere. To do that I need to ensure I get some theatre producers in the audience. If I want to get other work from it then I need to ensure I also get some commissioning editors and dramaturg folk along.

This whole process is obviously going to take a lot of work so it’s goodbye competitive pool and hello theatre world. I’m back and I’m hoping it will at least be with a bang of some sort…