The Edinburgh Fringe Festival starts in just a few days and a play that began life as a small piece in the First Writefest last year has been expanded and is going to join the fun.
My Voice(s) started as a ten minute piece as part of an evening of new writing. Although Progress has produced similar evenings for the last 10 years, known as "Showcase", with the aim of giving new writers, actors and directors a chance to hone their skills, last February was the first time that the event was publicised to the general public.
Kerry Murdock (who you might have seen in Entertaining Mr Sloane last year) wrote a piece about a woman recovering from the break-up of a relationship and advised, sometimes helpfully, often not, by three of her own inner voices played by Alice Mulford (Good Woman of Setzuan), Emma Sterry (choreographer for Godspell) and Tonya Walton (The Woman Who Cooked Her Husband). As an intense piece of physical theatre, full of music and dance, it wowed the audiences and Kerry took it on herself to develop the piece and take it to Edinburgh with her own theatre company
Friction Theatre (visit
their blog).
Keeping the same cast, also including Owen Goode (Good Woman of Setzuan, Godspell) and Alana Ramsey (Good Woman of Setzuan), and director Steph Weller (Skylight) the new improved piece has been in preparation for months, received a preview performance at the Midlands Arts Centre in Birmingham and the entire crowd arrived in Edinburgh last night ready for the first performance this evening. If you're in that part of the country, you can see them as the Rocket @ Demarco Roxy Art House at 10.45pm each evening. Alternatively, YouTube has a video of the
show as seen at Progress.
If you're a writer and want more information about Progress' Writer's Group, please contact us at
enquiries@progresstheatre.co.uk
