Videography - Femi Johnson

Videography - Femi Johnson

Videography - Femi Johnson

The train that passes through Salisbury to Exeter, it flows through Sherborne, Yeovil, Crewkerne, and Axminster. When it rains the River Kit floods the fields, sometimes angrily bursting its banks onto the trainline. Yeovil Junction becomes an island, with shivering and suffering commuters cramped over the bridge. 

The sandbags are built higher, and the channels dug deaper, yet the river still swells. Rainfall is blamed, hardened dry soil is blamed, and no one suspects that the train may be responsible - that the river might protest the fumes that run past it. Or I, the passenger, and what I may bring through.

For since I first saw the river swell I have, upon each passing on the train, tipped into its banks the corpses of any human who has displeased me. A work colleague who was rude to me; the neighbour who uses his bins to claim a parking spot he doesn’t deserve; the CEO of a social media corporation. I watch their bodies plop into the marshland. 

Dorset floods with my pettiness. My unresolved needs, my conflicts of interest, they float like bloated parsnips, pecked at by birds. My anger ferments in the flora, leaving purple rotting sausage arms at the side of the tracks. Every year the flood grows wider, the bodies spread further, til the landscape is spoiled and pungent. 

The rage is unrelenting. The more I tip, the more it flourishes. Reinforced. The train is delayed, the train is moored, and I stew in the soup of my own making. My fleshy chowder. The furious goulash of the South West, ground to a halt and simmering. 

And finally South Western Railway announce they cannot wade through any longer. The South West is separated, doomed to the waves like Doggerland. The bodies have piled too high, and even the most determined train driver buckles at the prospect of tearing through the carcass ponds. The cadaver wetlands. Their acting CEO (their actual CEO has taken a leave of absence for gout) sends me a Microsoft Teams call invitation. I don’t know how he knows who I am, but clearly I’ve been less subtle than initially thought on my weekly commute.

He says, we did try to let this slide, but it’s come to a point where we can’t really ignore it anymore. We’re going to have to ask you to stop dumping corpses. It really is causing quite a problem. The river has almost hit the A303 and if that gets cut off as well then we’re really truly buggered.

The problem is there was a particularly loud group of 5 a side footballers in the park outside my house this weekend, so I’m already falling behind on disposal. Where else am I supposed to put them? There is no other outlet for my deep-set homo sapien suffering. My mammalian melancholy. My hominine rage. My bipedal bitterness. I channel through the bodies, into the river, and into the soil. My inability to process traumatic emotions is my Achille’s heel, and everyone must endure the consequences. 

People have lost their homes, he pleads. One woman found the head of one of those men who pedals bikes through Soho with seats at the back playing loud Y2K classics on her back patio. Her cat was eating it. There simply is no further capacity for corpses in what was the River Kit and now stretches from Glastonbury to Weymouth with your wrath of the departed. When will it end? 

It will end when people stop pissing me off.

So the rescuers come, descending in their flame-red high-vis suits to lift the citizens and their stranded pets to safety. As the river reaches doorsteps and backsteps and sidesteps and whirlpools sink the bodies to the peat-bed. Preserving them all, my manuscript.

Wendy Haines

Lament, lament, lament.

Sorrow, sorrow, sorrow.

Get over it.

What would yous know?

Have you been?

Have you seen?

Do you know what it’s like?

Because let me tell you –

It’s glorious.

It’s dangerous.

It is.

“I had my day with kings” says themuns.

And I suppose yous are right, I did.

But so what.

A king is just a king.

How do they become kings?

These bastions of authority and reverence hahahaha.

They become kings when Medb decides she wants to bed them. That is a king. Someone who Medb deems worthy to sleep with her.

Enough about them.

Here’s me.

Come inside and explore.

Everyone wants to look at the hill and the stone, but I says listen. And you will hear the sound of the running water inside the mountain.

‘Mon to the water. Sit with your euphoria and your sadness. Let the breeze hold you and receive the spark in your belly. It will come if you let it.

The world is wider and I am wider.

Have you seen my kingdom?

And yet they tell me I am shrivelled.

Stuff words into my mouth.

“I speak no honied words” says themuns

Honey is my words, when I want it to be, but all words do not need to be thick and sweet.

A sharp, bony cry is as good as anything.

A bloody shriek is sometimes just the thing.

A croak.

A whimper.

A gulder.

“Age is on me” says themuns

But joy is on me

Ta athas orm

What is on can be taken off

The cloak or the smock, whatever yous want to call it, is not me, I only wear it.

Louise Parker

Bees build bumble bungalows

Bees birth baby bugs

Bees brush burnished blooms

Bees bury bodies between blossoms

Bees burgle botanical bribes

Bees bring back bounties

Bees brew blessed beverages

Bees die.

But a day like this

Sun that tricks you into thinking

Fuck yes, summer!

So you sit outside and sup that pint

That becomes two or three or lots

And he’s beside you

And there’s nothing you don’t dare

And his eyes flare yellow  

Reflecting gorse flowers.

In the old story, they make a bet

That they’ll meet on the hillside

Among the scented broom,

And she can’t/can/won’t/will come back home a virgin.

Five hundred quid on the table

Damp-edged with beer-spill.

Done.

And she tricks him,

Leaving him to doze and snooze in the midday heat

Drugging him with petals of broom

So he can’t do/take/force/hurt

So she can skim quick as small birds through the woods

And away.

Done.

A different story if the hill’s covered in gorse.

What then?

Does she creep into the heart of the prickles

Gripping, rooting,

Trusting the spiked walls of her nest to

Rip his soft hands to shreds.

Does he hunt her through the snagging branches

‘Til he’s ribbons of flesh,

Tangled, snarled, ruined,

Sweet meat for the little birds

To eat their fill.

Or does she fire the brae and the boy both together

Yellow flame dancing in her eyes

As all that sweetness turns to smoke.

And done.

Stephe Harrop

Man. Er, so. Let me, er, introduce—let me just say a few—well, hello.

None of you know me. I don’t think. But, well

Well I have something I think I would like to say

It’s something I’ve been considering for a long time

You see, I have, er, a, er, PhD in – in – er, Classics

I suppose you might not know what Classics are, but,

You see, a long time ago, a long long time ago, there were these—

Ok, never mind that, let’s just…

Have you ever considered your positions in the world?

You all, in this park, taking breadcrumbs from, er, you know, us

You know, monkeys, really

Was there a point you thought, huh, how did we end up here?

Well, er, well, there’s this, this, play, this old play from this old, very old, very—

It’s a comedy, and it’s – oh you probably don’t know what a comedy is, well—

Ducks too.

Well, a comedy is – you see there’s – ok, never mind, let’s move on, the point is

The point is that in this play, this thing people used to act out, you – you, and others,

Others like you, you, take over, you have a revolution, you overthrow the gods!

Er, gods being, being – uh – ok, that’s also beside the point, the point is, you win

You become top dogs – not dogs, sorry, top, top, top – you know

And that got me to thinking. Because my husband – er, my part—erm, my

My mate. He has his PhD in, in – he’s what we call a, er – palaeontologist

And you won’t be alone in not knowing what that is, god, no, but you know, we laugh

Because he knows what that’s all about and I know why he’s called a palaeontologist

You see, in Greek, in the language, actually that the play is in it, paleo means – 

Geese.

Never mind.

The point is

The point being

My husband, my mate, he said

You know, when they write a play about, er, birds, taking over

It’s funny

But birds, they – they

They weren’t always birds. They were, you were, you were

Another Greek word, you were, dinosaurs – terrible lizards

Swans. Hefty, hefty swans.

I hope that doesn’t offend you, lizards, it’s just what they thought were

When they first found the evidence, but now, now we know, there were

Feathers and

And

He is totally, utterly, completely surrounded by birds. And he’s running out of bread.

And the point is

What my mate said

Write that play with dinosaurs, not birds

And it’s not a comedy

David Bullen

In a functional fibreglass boat

They took some snacks, and tics and tacs

Wrapped up in their windproof coats

Maurice looked up to the clouds above

And sang to the dolphins afar

Oh lovely Maralyn, Maralyn my love

What a beautiful woman you are

You are!

You are!

What a beau- is that a whale?

How charmingly sweet it sings

We’re bound for New Zealand, with rhymes and reasons

To land in the time of Spring

They sailed away, but the whale did stay

And smashed its hump to the bow 

And there in the ocean, a sailing commotion 

We’re sinking, what do we do now?

The lifeboat

The raft

We’re sinking, what do we do now?

And I fear we will never get home 

My skin it splinters, from the sun of not-Winter

My distaste for this dinghy has grown’

They dreamed of mince, and slices of quince,

But there were only scraps for food

Turtles and gulls, meagre morsels

They starved by the light of the moon,

The moon,

The moon,

They starved by the light of the moon.

For one hundred and seventeen days

To protect their sanity, she’d plan dinner parties

Serving whale and blubber three ways

Til a glimmer of hope, in one fishing boat

Did rescue the pair from their plight

Their suffering absolved, the couple resolved

They’d do it again in a fortnight

Again Maurice!

Again Maralyn!

We'll do it again in a fortnight

Wendy Haines

She’s carrying twins. She is of exceptional strength and speed, and has asked her husband not to speak of this to anyone, wanting to be left alone and to live the life she’s chosen, rather than born into. 

At a feast her husband shouts claims of her extraordinary abilities to the king as he shows off his new horses, and challenges them to race or face death. Egos collide, promises are made and it’s announced his wife will race these horses, or he will be killed. Tragedy ensues.

Moving slowly, half dazed by the morning sun 

The wind blew sharp as a knife, the beach was innocent of footprints. Yet. 

An ambush, a trap, an ardent voyeur pollutes the scene;

A silken head turns - some sound on the wind unexpected.

At once the selkies are ragin, anger pulsing through their scales.

He who wishes to capture the condemned soul. A man of small heights and high ambitions.

Hungry to hold soul and scale in his hands.

He’s been here before. 

In dreams and skulking reality

He’s imagined slipping his fingers through the cast-off skin, locking it away and tossing the key

He is slabbering down himself in anticipation.

Pink and green are unzipped, scattering in camouflage on the pebble shore.

Cries of the new borns echo the shore, placenta of the shedded skin coat the rocksNot

Smell of seaweed; salt - insides exposed and warmly slick

Seductive wind, weird sensuality

The would-be hunter leans closer, fingers in the wet algae

A sharp shard of shell slices his skin, blood everywhere, salt stinging his hand.

Outward he cries, the air stings. The condemned soul hears him and her eyes dart the shoreline.

Not fully grounded in her new found body, legs too weak to walk yet, she uses the water to push herself forward, bringing him down around his neck 

Sticking tight as a new skin, flashing pinkgreensilver as she/he falls

A splash, a sudden, panting grasp of briny breath

The silkie soul leans in, to kiss or bite

Water floods into his open mouth and his eyes widen, she stops

Is there mercy, when she is condemned and he is free to roam and entangle himself in others

Spluttering, gasping for air, he hears one word 

Water

It fills him, becomes his world

Together they sink, one hand reaching back for the precious skin

Skin and sea envelop them completely, they slip beneath grey frothy waves

The bog moss is managerial. 

It absorbs, it holds the water like a cradle.

Eight times its own weight.

In carpets of many colours.

Workflows the bog, streamlining.

A project manager.

Protecting the outcomes and pooling resources.

A sponge with purpose.

Reviewing peat output according to budget

An evaluation process

bog moss

boss mog

mob goss

Comprehensive

An accrual of cost

Monitoring and reporting

Negotiator of the wetlands

Gives return on investment

Your daily checks

For the fundamentals

Undervalued and obliterated

They don’t live in a hierarchical group

A friend of my friend is my friend too

Dominance is a liability

Achieving a socal balance

A need for sleep and no arguments

Their nearest relative is the elephant

Or distant relative that is nearest

Tusks for incisors

6-7 months gestation

the cliff is no longer there for them to return to

Digging holes in the soil and the sedimentary rock

the male glands

Foot pads

a subspecies of least concern

But it cannot swim

my bones will be hollow.

My tongue will wrap around my brain to keep it safe

or else my head will be held three times higher

or turn twice as far around in back

or move in perfect sync with my feet

to stabilise my surroundings.

When I will be a bird

my keeled sternum will wrap around my heart to keep it safe

and to hold the muscles that lift my hollow bones.

The parts of my skull will move independently

so eating will be much easier.

When I will be a bird

my pubic bone will turn backwards 

shifting my centre of gravity

and my feet will be ancestral 

and I will walk on tip-toe and never topple.

When I will be a bird

I will breathe deeply

and my lungs will be, proportionally, twice as large

but there will be dead space, too, in my throat

almost five times as much.

And when I will be a bird

I will have to take care

to keep my feathers safe and my feet

and my heart will beat much faster

and I will scream in the morning and evening

for food and sex and the chance to stay alive.

And when I will be a bird

I will fly farther every year and earlier

and harder through the wind and heat to less land

and arrive hungry at the wrong time

however easily the parts of my skull move.

So when I will be a bird

I will be free to fly and for my network to fall apart

to preen and pick out fewer insects from between my feathers

to lay an earth-shaped egg and keep it safe.

And when I will be a bird

the world will be harder and easier and beginning and still ending

and though I will no longer know why

I will feel the shift of the changes 

in the gaps in my hollow bones.

Christine Plastow

that serves the Wirral’s hefty water needs,

the graves are open, coffin lids ajar;

the dead are plotting, in among the reeds.

They’re seeking justice for the sunken town

(and devolution’s not enough for that),

so when Llyn Celyn’s surface level’s down,

they make their way to parliament to chat.

The English ministers quake in their boots

As scores of angry wet Welsh dead appear

Dripping, tangled up in weeds and roots

And make their case for reparations clear.

So now the dead are back in drier graves,

And Westminster sinks deep beneath the waves.

Christine Plastow

Annie Siddons

Christine Plastow

David Bullen

Gemma Storr

Katie Overstall

Louise Parker

Malinda Smith

Marcus Badger

Sinead Costelloe

SJ Brady

Stephe Harrop

Wendy Haines

Special thanks to our Production Assistants Yukari Endo and Anna Seyerle for their documentation and contributions during rehearsal.

Scary?

Funny?

Magical?

Rousing?

I’m not special. I’m terribly afraid of grief. I’ve experienced it, and found the anticipation of those weighty losses that everyone must endure has spoiled my joy of the present. I think these stories were my way of prior grieving, as if that might soften the future blows.

This fear of grief, and grief of a parent, seems to be the way I interpersonally understand something as destructive and ominous as the climate crisis. Comprehending and responding to its scale, and the loss that is coming, feels near impossible. Grief became my way of relating.

They were commissioned in 1852 and designed by Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins, with scientific input from Sir Richard Owen.

They didn't have much information to go on when it came to dinosaurs back then, and so the outcome was an interpretation based on available fossils and artistic flair.

We were enamoured by these creatures that through mystery became mythological.

(Thank you to Annie Siddons for giving us the walking tour.)

Conceived and produced by Theatre of the Gentle Furies.

Performers - Katie Overstall, Louise Parker, Birte Widmann

Lead Writer and Editor - Wendy Haines
Project Writers -
David Bullen, Kay Lynn Er, Rebecca Tomasso, Katie Overstall, Louise Parker, Christine Plastow

Dramaturgs - Annie Siddons, David Bullen, Christine Plastow, Katie Overstall

Director - David Bullen
Production Assistant - Yukari Endo
Musicians & Composers - Gemma Storr, Laura Forrest-Hay
Design - Christianna Mason
Academic consultant (climate) - Marcus Badger

Academic consultant (storytelling) - Stephe Harrop

Marketing consultant - Angeliki Kitrini

Poster Design - Kati Lacey 

Videography/Photography - Femi Johnson

Social Media - Madeleine Schafer Jones

Find out more at https://chanse.org/coastarts/