Being a ‘fly on the wall’ in a rehearsal room can be unsettling and that’s certainly the case at Newcastle’s Live Theatre where one of the most eagerly awaited shows of the autumn is taking shape.
A key scene in the latest manifestation of Our Friends in the North involves a confrontation between Geordie, one of the four main characters, and Soho porn king Benny Barratt.
It crackles with menace. “Is that a gun in your pocket or are you just pleased to see me?” smirks Barratt as his towering henchman scrutinises Geordie’s every move.
Actor Chris Connel can do menace like falling off a log, making Barratt’s affable chit-chat a clear sign of imminent violence… and yet, this being a rehearsal, he’s suddenly off script, joking as Chris rather than Benny.
Geordie, played by Scott Turnbull, is clearly in for it. But when the duffing up comes, it’s played over and over again, director Jack McNamara working with the actors to get it right.
There’s humour in a carefully choreographed mauling and Scott, picking himself up off the floor for the umpteenth time, is alert to it. But in spite of the banter, he’s up for playing the victim one more time.
The attention to detail and the jovial atmosphere in the room, packed with the technical staff and every member of a big cast, bodes well for a show due to open at Newcastle Theatre Royal (this being a co-production) this month.
Hundreds of miles away down south, writer Peter Flannery is finally able to revel in the revival of a story which has been with him for more than 40 years, ever since he was resident writer at the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1980.
The opportunity afforded by his Stratford stint was what first gave rise to Our Friends in the North, he recalls.
“I had the run of the place. The only thing I had to do in return for my time there was write them a play.
“It would have been impossible to go away and write a two-hander.
“I was surrounded by them doing the history plays and I thought, well, I’ve got to write one of those – a big chronicle-type play about what it’s like to be in England now.
“The actual subject matter came initially from talking to my parents who were very uninterested – cynical, actually – about politics locally and nationally.
“Whenever I asked them why, they’d always talk about corruption and this wasn’t something I’d particularly thought about, so I decided to look into corruption in public life and found rather a lot.”
Peter went to speak to T. Dan Smith, one-time leader of Newcastle City Council, a man once known as Mr Newcastle, who in 1974 was sentenced to six years on corruption charges.
He told Peter, somewhat ironically: “There’s a play here of Shakespearean proportions.”
Peter recalls that he was very forthcoming.
“It took him a while to accept the fact that I was not going to pay him. I said the RSC isn’t going to pay you and I’ve got no money so whatever you do has got to be for the love of it.
“He clearly saw himself as the hero of this play of Shakespearean proportions whereas I didn’t, but I did see him as an important figure, or at least a character based on him.
“That was the character (Austin Donohue) eventually played on TV by Alun Armstrong.”
Peter’s play, staged in Stratford and Newcastle, also dealt with police corruption and attempts to bypass sanctions on oil sales to Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) in the 1960s.
The play was a quart into a pint pot but it was well received, and it was nice for the Jarrow-born playwright to have it performed in the North East.
Then, 14 years later, came the epic BBC TV series of 1996 which, recalls Peter, just kept growing – from four episodes, to eight and finally nine.
It extended the story through the Thatcherite 1980s although it wasn’t quite big enough to accommodate the Rhodesia thread which was dropped, to Peter’s regret.
Now, marking the 30th anniversary of the series, comes this new stage play.
To make it manageable, it focuses on two of the TV episodes, those set in 1979, when Margaret Thatcher became Prime Minister, and 1984, the start of the miners’ strike.
Hence the title Our Friends in the North: The Thatcher Years.
Peter says despite initial reluctance he came to enjoy adapting his own material for the stage, and of revisiting Geordie, Tosker, Nicky and Mary, the friends whose fortunes so many people followed over the nine episodes.
He attributes the success of the series to the fact that they’re relatable characters. “They’ve got no superpowers. They’re just like us.”
Aged 28 when he wrote the play, about the same age as his protagonists in episode one, he says: “They’re four aspects of me, in simple terms.
“I’m a firm believer that you can only write about what you know and all I really know is me.”
Back in the rehearsal room, some of the other actors are now the focus of attention, taking direction from Jack McNamara (artistic director of Live Theatre) but also making suggestions of their own.
“I’m a collaborative director,” says Jack afterwards. “I like to create an atmosphere in the room that makes everyone feel creatively inspired.
“This is a new entity and I want everyone to feel they’re owning it.”
Jack Robertson (Tosker) and Sam Neale (Mary) run through a short but touching scene while Trevor Fox, one of the region’s most experienced actors, also comes to the fore.
Trevor had a part in the original TV series of Our Friends in the North and also performed in a radio adaptation.
One of his roles this time is as a narrator figure whose role is to move the story forward.
Peter Flannery says such a character was in his original RSC play but had to be cut when it became too long.
This new production promises to be a terrific showcase for homegrown acting talent.
Ryan Nolan (Nicky), Meena Al-Nawrasy and Jude Nelson are all graduates of the Theatre Royal’s actor training programme, Project A, while Leo James and Robert Punchard attended Live Theatre’s Youth Theatre.
Peter Flannery, meanwhile, says this might be his swansong as a writer, it having become harder to get commissioned TV scripts actually made.
He will, however, be in Newcastle on opening night, delighted, he says, to have a play on for the first time at the Theatre Royal, where Our Friends in the North: The Thatcher Years is due to run from October 15-24.