River's Up

When the Larsen B ice shelf (an area the size of Wales) broke away from the Antarctic continent before the last millennium I knew the game was up as far as the environment was concerned, so I wrote River's Up commissioned by Alan Ayckbourn for the Stephen Joseph Theatre, about a middle-aged couple who lived by the River Severn in Worcester, who suddenly find themselves caught up in a cataclysmic global event when the flood waters don't recede.   It has since been produced by the Swan Theatre, Worcester, had a critically acclaimed BBC Radio production, two sell-out productions in Rome, where it is called Effetto Serra, and a rural tour with Oxfordshire Theatre Company, 2009.  It is sobering to think I wrote this play back in 2000, before the recent dreadful flooding in Worcester, when I found myself stuck in my home town of Malvern completely surrounded by water and cut off from the outside world.  Following the recent floods over the last couple of weeks (which are now becoming an annual occurrence), I thought I might try and plug the play again and try and get another production; but it is notoriously difficult for lesser known playwrights to get second productions, for some reason theatres like to have world premieres of plays.  But the play has proved itself and the subject matter is current, and as far as I am concerned really important.  I have been an environmental campaigner for as long as I can remember; more especially involved with Greenpeace, and therefore the state of the planet is something I have been writing about for some time, it's is an issue I feel passionately about and have been addressing dramatically for many years.  The first play I wrote touching on this subject was Canned Peaches In Syrup, a Romeo And Juliet story concerning a cannibal and vegetarian tribe set in a world fractured by global warming, which I wrote in the dressing room of the Birmingham Rep. This play has had many readings in this country, but no production here yet; a couple of near misses though, including the offer of a production at Nottingham Playhouse following a week of workshopping, but my agent at the time turned it down for a (supposedly) better opportunity which sadly never came off.  But the play had its world premier in America some years ago with fantastic reviews and was published there too; there was also a great production of the play in Italy.  I've been pushing this play for a while and more particularly River's Up, and always have great feedback; a few years ago though the literary manager of a major theatre contacted me after reading River's Up to tell me how much he'd enjoyed it, but couldn't offer a production as they had just been offered a script that was similar; "Actually," he said, sounding a little confused, "It's really very similar, amazingly similar in fact."  He then asked me about the history of the play and was suddenly very guarded about their upcoming production and steadfastly refused to reveal the name of the writer.  The production never happened, but alarm bells were ringing for me.  It's tough when things like this happen, and the possibility that someone out there might be simply ripping off your work is something that is so upsetting it can ruin you as a writer; make you depressed and question the point of writing anything at all.  So I'm still forging ahead with that play, and hope that I can get its message out there again, because as I said, the issues are really heartfelt.  Below is the synopsis:

'Tom and Sally Millington’s house is about to be flooded yet again!  Sally is worried and blames the icebergs, though Tom seems more concerned about the drunken Brummie revellers he has to sail up the Severn every weekend on his disco-boat.  But this time the water level shows no sign of retreating, and before long they’re drifting around a watery Worcester searching for the Malvern Hills.  Perhaps their resourceful son-in-law, Darren has made it to France with Caroline and little Sean and Jessica - it's a long way, but what choice do they have?  The irrepressible Millington's begin to realise they are witnessing the results of a global cock-up.  Join them on their poignant journey in a dilemma that pits them against cataclysmic odds in a comic/tragedy of epic proportions...'