The Twelve Monologues Of Christmas

Well that was a nice little challenge, mission accomplished and all that. Writing 12 monologues in four days looked easy enough to me, but then other things (play rehearsals, band rehearsals, beers with friends) suddenly got in the way and I wasn't so sure it was going to happen. Anyway - we have the site courtesy of Steve, we have a logo courtesy of Chris, and we have 12 monologues all nice and ready to be heard. Steve rightly pointed out that to end on Christmas Eve we'd actually have to start on Tuesday, not Monday, so that did give us an extra day, and I felt a bit silly regarding my lack of numerical ability.

Although most of it was written late at night, I'm really happy with a majority of the pieces. Izzy came over on Saturday to record the first seven - she's such a professional, I'm baffled as to how fluent she was with the material having not read it before, her range of voices is fantastic and she did really well bringing some of the 'lesser' pieces to life. Grace came over this evening to record the other five - there's a reason why I want to work with more with Grace and that's not just because she's the most enthusiastic and happiest person you could ever work with - it's because like Izzy she's a top-notch pro and tonight's session was so easy (in fact we finished so early we ended up reading through some other material I've been working on recently with 2012 in mind). Working with actors like this allows me to experiment - I know that a majority of 'The Twelve Monologues Of Christmas' is really twee, really gentle, but it does go dark (monologues ten and eleven, to be precise) - with lesser performers this wouldn't have worked, but my pieces 'The Silent Night' and 'The Silent Night 2' are not concepts I would have dared try before. Grace's performance of both of those this evening almost shook me up a bit, I was sat next to her during the recording of them and really believed she was an upset/nearly grieving girlfriend, shivers down my spine and all that, I nearly fetched her a tissue. Obviously as soon as she pressed stop she was back to her normal chatty self, these actors are clever, you know. And as for 'The Christmas Singer' - this is potentially the most uninteresting piece I've ever written but it sounds wicked because Izzy added a million new to dimensions to it with her performance.

Both days recordings were short (Izzy around for three and half hours on Saturday, Grace around for about two and a half tonight), it's hardly the most professional environment - a fancy dictaphone and my little flat which currently has a heating issue, but in a rough and ready, raw theatre kind of way I'm proud of this. Anyway - check it out - http://www.12monologues.co.uk/

Right, no more projects this year, I sense that could have been one too many, it worked out well and I'm glad I've done it, but no more. We've got the Christmas show next week which is looking brilliant (Heather's directing is top-notch), and before that the Eureka Stockade/Aidy/Flaming June festive party-gig, and before that two parties in a row which are likely to utterly destroy me. And then next Sunday it's Christmas. Where has this year gone?