Thursday 19 January 2017
After a non-stop 5 months working as an actor in Seriously Dead and Jack and the Beanstalk, I’m now putting on my writer’s hat again.
Today I had a meeting with Jeff Brown from BBC’s Look North, who has written a one-act one-man play, Cornered, about an ex-Sunderland AFC player (based on Jeff’s experiences as a sports journalist/reporter over the past couple of decades.) I first saw Jeff read an excerpt from the piece at a scratch night, and immediately offered to produce it under my company Cranked Anvil. It’s all systems go, and we have set a date for a number of performances in various venues around Sunderland in September this year.
We will present it as part of a double-bill of one act plays based around the football club, and I am now starting work on the companion piece. It’s working title is ‘Wise Men Say’ (if you ever go to a Sunderland match you’ll hear the fans singing it loud and proud on the terraces) and it will be a humerous but heartfelt homage to the club and its fans.
After the success we had a couple of years ago with our production of I Left My Heart In Roker Park, and with 2017 being the 20th anniversary of the Stadium of Light AND the 25th anniversary of Sunderland’s last FA Cup final appearance, Cornered / Wise Men Say is likely to be the hottest ticket in Sunderland this year!
PAUL DUNN 