PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER

The moment has come to really start putting it together now!

I am dividing my days between writing creatively and production.

We have a new date for the Showcase at the Oxford Playhouse, it is Sunday 27th April, probably at 6pm. This will give our London audience the chance to spend a day in beautiful Oxford, see the show and get back to London at a reasonable time.

I have some amendments to do to the script now that Sally Sandys Renton has gone over it with a fine tooth comb to check for any technical mistakes. One thing she came up with was that I cannot use the phrase Arts and Crafts, because this was not coined until after Morris's death. I also have to change the lead up to the RIVER song because the song has changed the action. I think the river song is almost there now but we still have to write Rossetti's madness song and the central love song between Jane and Rossetti. I have sketched out some skeletal verses for both of these already.

Our new director Helen Eastman and Steve and I are drawing up a cast list but a lot depends on whether we get Anna Francolini to play Janey again. Once I hear from her agent then we can start contacting the other actors for the musical.

I have been in touch with a few companies for sponsorship but am working on a pitching letter to send out to others and a dear friend at the BBC is helping me with this. My son has agreed to take charge of sending out these letters before he goes off to Venice on his gap year. He has a wonderful job working for the Brandolini's until June but has promised to fly back to come and see the showcase.

We are planning a design meeting with Peter Dunphy and Karl Roberts next week to discuss everyone's design vision and hopefully come to some agreement about what we all want. We are also looking for a theatre lighting designer to liase betweeen our film designer and the theatre.

I am working like a beast with two heads. Luckily, having worked as an agent and writer in the past makes this not such an alien experience. If we had got our Arts Council grant in the first place I would be able to concentrate solely on the writing which would have made things a lot easier!

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