We are all a work in progress

Newsletter #14 | February 2024

All stories are about the same thing

Of the many playwrights I worked with back when I was a Director, the one whose words stay with me is Simon Stephens.

When meeting aspiring playwrights, he’d start with the provocation:

“What do all plays have to be about?”

Usually, we’d hear ‘conflict’, ‘story’, ‘character’. All close, but not quite right. Obvious when you finally arrive at it, the answer of course is ‘people’.

In fact, you could argue this is true not just of all plays but of all stories. Animal Farm? People as animals. Toy Story? People as Toys. Transformers? People as robots. (You get the picture.)

Whatever they tell of, the narratives we immerse ourselves within are perennially populated by the heroism and heart-ache of human beings.

Human after all

Meanwhile, leisure pursuits like dining, drinking and dancing are done predominantly in groups. Sport is played in teams or against an opponent. Most of us have partners, friends, families. We network socially. We learn publicly. And at work we collaborate with others to progress towards a common purpose.

A constant cast of characters populate our personal and professional lives.

And yet - so often the source of our discomfort is the very thing we have sought to surround ourselves with; people.

People who are at once ambitious and over-bearing. Pragmatic and pedantic. Inspirational and exhausting. Empathetic and self-doubting.

People who frustrate us, amaze us, halt our progress, see our potential, betray us, believe in us, embarrass us, champion us, leave us, love us, break our hearts and fill them up.

People who are broken, brilliant, difficult, delightful, inadequate, incredible, imperfect, human.

Just like us.

Radical acts of empathy

Four years after leaving behind an organisation I led for a decade, guess what I miss the most? It’s not the pay check, the power or the prestige; it’s the people.

The people I worked with, for, alongside; creatives, producers, administrators.

The characters who our collective act of imagination made real; Alex in Seawall, W in Lungs, the boy in Every Brilliant Thing.

And the audiences moved to laughter, tears or spontaneously radical acts of empathy.

So next time your boss is driving you bonkers, your mum makes you mad or you’re infuriated by your best friend, take a moment to remember we are all a work in progress.

Because if I believe nothing else, I believe this; Joni Mitchell was almost right.

We won’t know who we’ve got til they’re gone.