Diamonds in the ruff: new writing at Gorey Castle

Sunday 18 September 2016

This year’s Festival of Words will commence with an evening of short plays inspired by Shakespeare at Gorey Castle to mark the 400-year anniversary of his death.

Local new writing initiative Plays Rough (which has temporarily changed its name to the suitably Shakespearean ‘Plays Ruff’) are opening Jersey’s second literary festival with five Shakespeare-inspired pieces in and around Mont Orgueil castle.

With writing from Andrew Davey, Ben Evans, Martha MacDonald, Richard Pedley and Colin Scott, the evening will take the shape of a promenade performance where the audience will follow the action in different spaces around the heritage site.

The Plays Rough writers will be collaborating with local actors to bring the pieces to life as well as teaming up with members of the Jersey Arts Centre youtheatre for Andy Davey's play 'desrt islnd dscs'. In this twisted take on Desert Island Discs, the young actors will be spending their last night in Gorey Castle before being set adrift.

Mr Evans, co-founder of Plays Rough and one of the organisers of this ‘Inglorious Bardsters’ event is reviving his play ‘Green Man’ which was performed at last year’s Festival of Words at Jersey Library: 

“We’re all very excited about performing at Gorey Castle. Rehearsals for my play are currently slightly difficult geographically as one of the cast is away working in the Cayman Islands - but he’s been spending his down time performing to the local iguanas. Their reaction is hard to gauge.”

Pictured: Ben Evans' captive audience for his play 'Green Man'

Miss MacDonald added: “Plays Rough is such a great platform for local writers to try stuff out in front of an audience to gauge what works and what doesn’t work, but this event is an opportunity for us to take what we’ve learned from those evenings and showcase some more polished writing. 

“It was quite an intimidating brief; to write something that’s deliberately commenting on the greatest writer who ever lived, but I think we’ve all risen to the challenge and come up with five completely different and exciting pieces.”

To demonstrate just how different the writers' interpretations were, Mr Pedley's play 'Kill Will' is about the nature of destiny, free will and magic and Colin Scott's piece envisages a distant future where artificial life forms, in their struggle to become human, investigate whether Shakespeare may help them achieve consciousness.

The evening will start at 7pm with drinks (a free glass of wine is included in the price of a ticket) and the plays will begin at 7:30pm. 

There will be very limited seating for those who absolutely require it, but make sure to bring cushions to sit on and to dress in suitable clothing and footwear for walking around the Castle.

For more information about the evening, you can follow Plays Rough’s updates on Facebook and Twitter. Due to the promenade nature of the performance, there is very limited availability. You can book your tickets at the Jersey Opera House Box Office on 01534 511115 or click here to book online.