I like Miriam, a woman who’s taking a bit of a kicking from life and yet is standing stubborn against it all. Also Miriam is based on a marvellous woman called Tessa who lived in a house full of paper, who knew she had the beginnings of dementia, who knew the future was uncertain and scary. But she had more life in her than anyone else I have ever met.
And Bill: she reminds me that children make us grown-ups see the world in a fresh way, that they can give us a reason for living in a world that makes no sense. Bill has problems: her parents are in a mess… and that mess is spilling into her life. But she has fire in her spirit, eyes that still look out at the world, and most of all she has hope. Actually better than hope, she has the determination to make things a bit better. I like that.
So, I don’t like the play for the writer’s words – they are just inky squiggles on a page. And it isn’t the best play in the world, but I like it for the stories it tries to tell – about determined people and love and friendship.
I like it too because somewhere in the middle of the play it’s also about my dad who died last year. And it’s about my own children; and how they are ‘life-makers’.
I hope that when people work on the script – the director, actors, stage managers, designer that they get pulled closer to important people in their lives. And I hope the audience do the same. If that happened, I would like that.
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