Boot Camp Writers Assemble!

The 37 Plays – Writers Boot Camp with me, Kerrie L Marsh started this week. Now, boot camp is normally a word you associate with grueling tasks. A place where you imagine you will be shouted at and told to hit the deck and give said shouter twenty. Twenty reps of some hideous exercise like star-jumps or sit-ups. But not here at Hull Truck Theatre, we would never shout for twenty of anything from you. Perhaps encourage twenty… minutes of freewriting maybe.

The boot campers assembled in good spirits for our first session together. Made up of established, occasional dabblers and new aspiring writers. How awesome to have such a diverse group of creatives all in one space. Our boot camp writers are from all over the UK, the length and breadth from down south to Scotland and even from across the seas with one participant from Mexico. Not only were the opening introductory conversations fascinating, but this group are already a network within themselves and it’s a pleasure to be a part of.

The bootcamp is aimed at writers who have some written works already in their midst and which they desire to submit to the 37 Plays Project. It can be from scraps of notes and planning, half written scenes to completed scripts but the idea is for us to offer them support, guidance, and encouragement in order to feel confident enough to submit their play.

The sessions offer writing exercises and tasks that are generic but can be applied to each individual’s work with the hope to offer provocations yet help to find their own solutions for their script quandaries or story queries that they are pondering over. Building from the foundations of understanding what dramatic story telling involves and what makes compelling characters, we are asking the boot campers to be able to answer the questions, why this story? And, why now? Having a clear and confident answer makes the process and the enthusiasm to complete the works so much easier and satisfying. Also, it’s what all the big wigs always ask you when you are trying to flog them a script so it’s worth getting into the habit of.

The bootcamp is made up of three sessions in total. Two group sessions with the final session being a one-to-one session, allowing each participant the opportunity to speak solely about any last-minute worries and to ask any final questions before submission.

I have worked with so many amazing groups these past four months and as the young writers and schools’ workshops end, it’s a delight to continue with my playwrighting support for the people of Hull in the way of the boot camps.

Thanks for reading, now… Drop that TV remote! Pens at the ready and give me twenty minutes of script writing. Go!