Power of Invention

Lockdown and the closure of Birmingham museums meant a nine month postponement for this site-specific production about Matthew Boulton’s ground-breaking Lunar Society. We reconfigured the show as an outdoor production in the gardens of Soho House in Birmingham, to make it covid secure.  Click ‘continue reading’ or scroll down for older posts about the show.

Minted

Birmingham was riddled with forgers in the late eighteenth century. Some were so cocky that they even advertised on street signs.   Copper coins were in short supply. They were made by hand presses and so easy to forge that The Royal Mint didn’t bother making them. Its own study revealed that 92% of halfpennies were

Life is complicated

Like life, writing is about decisions and dilemmas. Especially when writing about characters from history. What do we know? Who were they really? Do the characters have to speak in ye olde worlde language…? James Watt undoubtedly is remembered for his extraordinary inventions. Mainly his steam engine, which he came to invent after trying to

Fire girl

I knew I wanted to write a servant character who worked for the Boultons at Soho House, for our upcoming new show Power of Invention (July 30th & 31st, August 7th 2021).  But where my Fire Girl came from, I don’t know.  Was it having my chimney swept last autumn; or setting up a makeshift fire pit on

BOLDtext heads to Soho House

On Friday 30th,  Saturday 31st July and Saturday 7th August 2021, BOLDtext Playwrights’ new site-specific & science-specific show, Power of Invention, will be performed at Soho House, the home of Birmingham’s Lunar Society. The show will explore the ground-breaking scientific advances inspired during the society’s full-moon meetings towards the end of the 18th century.   Centred