Take a Minute - Save a Life

I had a commission from Cardboard Citizens and the MIND in Harringey charity to write a play about the important issue of male suicide to coincide with World Suicide Prevention Day.  Having worked some time ago as a Samaritan volunteer I was delighted to be able to take part in such a vital project and contribute to awareness of such an important and neglected issue.  Suicide is seems is still something of a taboo subject, but the sad truth is that the number of men who took their own lives last year in the UK was 4,287.  I worked with the director, Stuart Mullins and a cast of actors and used research from the MIND charity and the Samaritans organisation to write a play on the subject.  I spent a short week writing the play in London, but the following week during rehearsals I had a call from Stuart saying one of the actors had had to pull out, so I had to travel to London again the next day and take his part.  The play was performed to a sell out audience at the Pleasance Theatre in London.  Below is some information and responses...

Posted on: 17 October 2017

Written by: Vicky Ream

Last week’s scratch performance with MIND in Harringey was a huge success, with the audience packing out the Pleasance Theatre to see the first performance of Take A Minute.

The show was based on a series of interviews and workshops facilitated by Cardboard Citizens with people affected by suicide. This was the first stage in the process to see how Forum Theatre can help to explore and raise awareness of mental health issues. The audience were invited to give suggestions on how we could take this model forwards and their thoughts on the content. We were overwhelmed by the positive and constructive audience feedback we received both through the discussion, Forum, feedback forms and social media.

Audience feedback included - 

“It made me more sure that every single thing helps no matter how ‘small’ it might be.”

“Notice more, talk more, listen more.”

“I was already aware of male suicide affecting a huge percentage of our population, but it has made me more aware of specific signs and issues and possible ways of approaching people who may be suffering.”

The evening ended with a panel discussion with Lynette Charles (CEO of MIND in Harringey), Stuart Mullins (Associate Director of Cardboard Citizens), Andre Skeete (Actor and Cardboard Citizens Member), Alex Jones (Writer and Actor) and Professor David Mosse (Chair of Haringey Suicide Prevention Group).

Cathy at Edinburgh Festival

Been touring in Cathy for some time, and the play has gone from strength to strength.  We took it to Edinburgh for the festival where it played for four weeks to pretty much sold out houses at the Dome Pleasance theatre.  Saw some great theatre while I was there too, including ‘The Nature of Forgetting’, a physical theatre piece by Theatre Re, punctuated with beautiful live music, about early onset dementia, which was easily the best show of the fringe and one of the most compelling and moving theatre I have ever seen.  We performed a few more venues in London and finished in Brighton, having been invited by the Labour Party to perform it at their conference.  The venue was packed and it felt kind of weird performing in front of famous faces you see daily on TV and in the media.  There followed an inspirational speech by Andy Burnham about how the Labour Party might tackle the housing crisis and what his council is trying to achieve in Manchester.  Later we were eating fish and chips in a nearby restaurant and the shadow chancellor, John McDonnell spotted us and came over to our table for a chat; he had seen the play in Edinburgh and was really congratulatory, stating how important the play’s message was and how housing would be top of the agenda should Labour be elected again... had a bit of a chat about Brexit too; he ensured me Labour would be challenging the Brexit bill in its various stages.  The play does seem to be touching nerves everywhere its performed, and I myself have a greater insight into what it is to be homeless through outreach work I have participated in with Cardboard Citizens, and working with and meeting their members too; who are truly inspirational people having suffered the indignities of homelessness and extreme poverty.  I have at one time in my life done quite a bit of sofa surfing in London and even lived for a while in a squat in Peckham, but I have never suffered the privations and despair that some of the desperate people I have met recently, and consider it shocking that families have to endure such terrible circumstances in modern day Britain.  But the bedroom tax, housing policy, greedy landlords and a seemingly uncaring government whose recent changes to the benefit system seem to me to be aimed primarily at those in society who are poor and dispossessed seem to my mind to make life even more difficult and challenging for those among us who are at the very brink of despair.  I have now begun to write a play inspired by things I have learnt whilst working on Cathy and inspired by the amazing people I have met along the way.  I think it’s an important modern day dilemma that deserves our attention.  Of course Ali Taylor’s fantastic play addresses some of these issues wonderfully, so I am approaching it from a different point of view; but it’s a massive subject with many, many disparate stories, and one I feel obliged to tackle.

Manchester bombing atrocity

The Manchester bombing, deliberately targeting young children innocently enjoying themselves at a concert is shocking beyond words.  I can’t comprehend how or why someone could be so cruel and callous, but I was distressed also to hear that Dr. Naveed Yasin, an orthopaedic surgeon who had spent 48 hours operating on the injured from that despicable crime was later racially abused in the street, called a ‘Paki bastard’ and told to go home.  While it is natural to be angry and even furious about what happened on that tragic day, we should remember that the person who committed this horrific crime was not a Muslim, but a terrorist, and the majority of Muslim citizens in this country are as equally appalled by what he did as are the rest of us.  I think on the whole the UK is a tolerant place to live and work, but sadly there are those among us who when events like this occur will use the occasion to voice their own hateful prejudices...  We are all human beings made of the same clay, bound on the same journey together, sharing the same planet; no single act, however horrifying and terrible should stand in the way of our unity; together we are strong, no matter what God we choose to worship or the colour of our skin.  Dr. Yasin was a hero who relentlessly battled to save the life of those injured on that fateful day, and Manchester is his home, England his country. 

Cathy at the House of Lords

Cathy tour is now over, and it’s been quite an experience as we performed not only in theatres, but homeless hostels and many prisons too, including Wormwood Scrubs and Pentonville and the inmates there were amazing; wonderfully welcoming and keen to share their own life experiences with us.  The very last gig a few weeks ago I think reflects the diverse venues we have been touring to, as we were invited to perform the play at the House of Lords as part of an evening reception for the ‘Homes for Cathy’ charity.  Again the people there were moved by the play and we were made very welcome by the Lords and MP’s who had attended the event, and were later invited to ‘Strangers Bar’ for a few late drinks by the labour shadow housing minister, John Healey.  Can’t believe it’s all over; it was difficult to say goodbye to the cast and crew after so long, but a fantastic final outing for Cathy, and what a privilege to have been a part of it all.   Here’s some picture of the event – the cast and crew and John Healey too!

A couple of breaks!

There was a break in the tour of ‘Cathy’ during December when I unfortunately had a second break!  During a drunken moment at a local party I accepted a challenge to arm wrestle; something I’ve done a few times with varying success... however this time things didn’t go quite as planned and I ended up with a rather nasty broken arm – see picture!  Well of course it was my own stupid fault for taking part in the first place, but also rather stupidly I was kneeling at the table, so my opponent had a bit of an advantage and was always gonna beat me.  I felt things weren’t going well and was just about to call time on the whole endeavour when I heard a sickening crack and my arm was suddenly limp and was dangling in a pretty alarming manner.  The pain was excruciating, so an ambulance was called and off I went to hospital.  My first thought was ‘will I still be able to perform in the show in a few weeks time’, and with the aid of a sling which I wore for the first scene, thankfully the tour carried on and I didn’t let anyone down.  However, a few weeks later we were visiting a night club in Manchester after a late show and it had been snowing and the steps down to the entrance were wet and I slipped and fell on my arm and broke it again!  My arm is on the mend though now, but not quite so well knit together as I would have hoped.  But as you can see from the picture there is evidence of another break from some years previous – a metal plate, seven screws and six pieces of wire in my elbow from an injury on a building site where I was labouring.  I’m always doing stuff like this and Sarah remarked that life with me is never dull... Got to be more sensible in future though... but I did arm wrestle in my local pub with my left arm recently and won too!

Acting again!

I’m treading the boards again!  Touring in Cardboard Citizens production of Cathy.  Been a while, but auditioned a month or so ago for this wonderfully powerful play by Ali Taylor which addresses many current issues regarding homelessness.  I’m playing five different roles and had a week to learn them before opening at the Pleasance Theatre in London as the previous actor had fallen ill and was unable to carry on...  A bit nerve-wracking the first few nights, but all is going well and I’m really enjoying acting once more.  We have also been playing at hostels and a woman’s prison, meeting some incredible people whose lives are sometimes sadly mirrored somewhat in the play.  We do a thing called ‘forum theatre’ afterwards involving the audience directly in decisions which the main character may have made to change her history; a unique theatrical technique I have never done before, but which really gets ideas and passions flowing.  Below are links to Cardboard Citizens and ‘Cathy’.  It’s quite an extensive tour if you can catch it...

CARDBOARD CITIZENS TOUR CATHY FROM OCT – BOOK TICKETS NOW  

Book now for our brand new Forum Theatre piece Cathy, on tour until Feb 2017. Written by award-winning playwright Ali Taylor and directed by Adrian Jackson, this powerful, interactive piece explores resonances with Ken Loach’s Cathy Come Home to offer a timely reflection on the impact of spiralling housing costs, gentrification and the challenges of the forced relocation away from London.

 

Click here to book now and join the conversation on Twitter using

The tragic case of Ellie Butler

The recent traumatic and devastating case of Ellie Butler, a six year old girl who was murdered by her father is something I find very disturbing; particularly as the trial judge exonerated him from a previous offence of shaking and injuring her as a small baby, and then after spending most of her life in the tender care of her grandparents she was handed over to a man and woman she barely knew.  I work as a carer in children’s homes with kids some who have been physically and sexually abused, and at the moment I am working with a very challenging ten year old girl whose parents were nothing short of monsters; the abuse she and her nine siblings suffered at the hands of their parents is something that will probably scar them emotionally for the rest of their lives, and the thought of this poor girl being sent back to the very people who did such terrible things to her fills me with horror.  Yet this is exactly what happened to Ellie.  Her grandfather has been speaking in the media about it recently, of how he and his late wife fought tooth and nail to keep her with them, but were basically told they were interfering with judicial procedures and warned to back off.  At the end of her life when her grandfather last saw her, Ellie was covered in bruises and was withdrawn and quiet... a few days later she was dead, and Ellie’s own mother colluded to cover up the murder.  We are only carers, but the work we do is the stuff no one really hears about, and believe me life in a children’s home is nothing like Tracy Beaker.  We work for minimum wage with complex kids who for various reasons cannot be fostered or adopted, and sometimes I do feel their needs are not properly supported by the agencies and social workers who should have their best interests at heart... a point sadly proved by Ellie Butler’s tragic story.