Royal Court writer on staging a play about mobile phone addiction
We caught up with the creator of this new play, a dark comedy about mobile phone addiction and three generations of women in one family
WHERE DID THE INSPIRATION FOR CUCKOO COME FROM? It started with being interested in things you’re allowed to say and talk about, about having opinions and people disagreeing. I also wanted to write something set in Birkenhead again, because it’s a world I know so well, and I just keep coming back to and feel really inspired by. It’s about a family of women, and I do write for women a lot and really love that. But initially I didn’t intend to write a female-only play. The characters just started speaking to me, and the path the plot took just happened – it wasn’t my intention. I followed it, and it ended up becoming central to the whole piece.
TELL US ABOUT THE IDEAS IN CUCKOO We’re living in a time which can feel quite strange and uncertain, with the pandemic, and Brexit, and weird weather. The characters are working class people who don’t have massive security. And when tenets of society, like education and health, perhaps aren’t working in the way they did before, things become even more uncertain. Especially with mental health and how people don’t quite know how to deal with those issues. There’s also this idea about the way we use technology, and especially phones, how these mini computers have taken over our lives. Maybe some things are crazier than they were. Or maybe it’s the fact we get newsflashes in the middle of a conversation about something we wouldn’t have known about in the past. So, it’s about all that. But it’s also the idea of a cuckoo in the nest, and there are two in the play – the phone is one, and Megyn is another. But I should say, a huge caveat is that it is a comedy! It’s the absurdity of how we live, and ultimately, it’s three generations of a family just trying to get on.
DO YOU HAVE MOBILE PHONE ADDICTION? It’s hard not to be – they design them to become addictive. We sit down on a train or a bus or the Tube and we just pick up our phone. We also have everything on them, our whole lives; we’re so reliant on them. You can see other people on their phones and think ‘look at them’, but I think we’re all just as bad.
WHY IS IT IMPORTANT TO YOU TO TELL WORKING-CLASS STORIES? We just don’t see most of the population on stage. And I think that was always a bit of the case. But thinking about the angry young men and kitchen sink dramas, and then people like Willy Russell and Alan Bleasdale and Jim Cartwright and even Shelagh Delaney, all these wonderful writers, I feel that I don’t know who the writers are at the moment. I worry about not seeing many working-class plays, or any working class actors. What’s the world a young writer or actor is going to be inspired by?
WHAT DO YOU HOPE AUDIENCES WILL TAKE AWAY FROM CUCKOO? Life is complex. Different characters have different struggles. But it’s hard to know what I want people to ultimately take away. Maybe if we all binned our phones, we might be a bit happier? With a lot of my plays, it’s quite funny at the beginning but then it gets quite dark. Hopefully we’ve got you by then and you want to stay. There’s a lot of theatre out there at the moment which can feel like you’re taking medicine or doing your homework. I think we need a bit of a laugh and also, yes, to have the world reflected back at us. But also to let go a bit and have a good night out.
Cuckoo is on at the Royal Court, tickets are on sale now
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