This sale of honours is a national scandal. It can be traced right down to 10 Downing Street

  GLASS HERO

Diary  

Cast and crew                                         

Mr Victor Grayson                                                      Mal Whiteley 

Mr Walter Adams                                                        Ryan Wilson

Mr Ernest Donovan                                                    Gareth Pilkington

Lucy                                                                             Marie-Line Grinda (Edinburgh)
                                                                                     Sarah Michaels (London)   

Mrs Elizabeth Grayson                                               Margaret Dent (Edinburgh)
                                                                                      Jane Pulford (London)  

Mr Maundy Gregory                                                   Greg Holmes

Mr Arthur Openshaw                                                   Gareth Pilkington

Mr George Flemwell                                                   Ryan Wilson (Edinburgh)
                                                                                      Gareth Pilkington (London)  

Behind the scenes:

Director                                                                Jim Grover (Edinburgh)
                                                                             Doug Holton (London) 

Technical design                                                    Chris Yun (Edinburgh)
                                                                             Francisco Miguel Tettamanti 
                                                                                                                      (London)

Biographies

 Mal Whiteley (Victor Grayson) studied at LIPA, Desmond Jones School of Mime, Ecole Philippe Gaulier and with Dorothea Alexander. Other stage appearances in the UK include Beckett's Endgame and Pinter's Trouble in the Works. He has toured in Europe with an adaptation of Orwell's Animal Farm to great public acclaim. He has also performed as a clown. Mal has also played Ben in the Secret Garden at King’s Head.

Greg Holmes (Maundy Gregory) trained at LCTS. He has fringe, repertory and film roles to his credit, including performing in the controversial Cold Fish, as Jeffrey Archer in the satirical Deptford Millennium Pantomime and a critically acclaimed role in Lucy Catherine's A Tender Prayer at the Courtyard Theatre. The repeat here of his Edinburgh Festivals role of Maundy Gregory is his second Jim Grover villain, having played Judge/Rocco in Provenance Helpline at the Etcetera Theatre.

Gareth Pilkington (Ernest Donovan/George Flemwell) has acting credits including Cause Celebre, The Deep Blue Sea, Otherwise Engaged, Strippers and Comedians. As playwright his staged work includes The Boy on The Bridge, The Teacher and The Soldier (also on the Internet) and New Jeans. The Stage was impressed with his directing of Murmuring Judges and his experience as director includes the first rehearsed readings of Glass Hero. He is a key member of RITE2STAGE.

Ryan Wilson (Walter Adams.Gearge Flemwell) has been acting with the Hal Company and RITE2STAGE for 5 years, playing in Midsummer Night's Dream, Murder in the Cathedral, improvisations and devised performances and was Lenin/Owner/de Medici.Nazi Officer in the revival of Jim Grover's Provenance Helpline at Royal Academy of Arts. Ryan is perhaps best known for playing guitar in C33X, having performed in UK, Europe and the USA and won the admiration of famous names like Morrissey, Alan McGee and Boy George. He repeats here his Edinburgh Festivals role of Walter.

Margaret Dent (Mrs Elizabeth Grayson) is an accomplished performer in theatre, film and television. Her one woman shows have been acclaimed in England, Scotland and Europe. Her skills also include singing, writing, presenting and after-dinner speaking.

Jane Pulford (Mrs Elizabeth Grayson) trained at the Guildford School of Acting and has worked extensively on stage and screen. Most recent productions include Verdi's Attila, Un Ballo in Maschera and directing Gluck's Der Betrogene Kadi. Mrs Grayson is another on Jane's list of playing "real people" such as Mrs Frank and Elvis Presley. The next major production is her wedding which will take place in March, in which she's playing the starring role. 

Marie-Line Grinda (Lucy) See her comprehensive website on http://www.marieline.com/

Sarah Michaels (Lucy) took her Drama Degree at Exeter. She has performed as Mother in The Box at the World Festival of Children’s Theatre, Mina in Dracula, Hilde in Master Builder, Mrs Borkman in  Gabriel Borkman, Lisa in Lisa Says and Queen, French Whore and ‘Peasant Girl’ in Becket. Her most recent work has been with RITE2STAGE, as Social Worker in Lady in the Van and Wendy in Gareth Pilkington’s New Jeans.

Doug Holton (director, designer, producer) is an accomplished playwright, director, dramaturg and general facilitator. Although based in this county his work is highly regarded in Palestine and India, where he has worked extensively. He is coordinator of LONDON LIVE!

   Jim Grover (playwright, director, designer) Plays include Golf War, Beating Time, Provenance Helpline and Pictures In Babcia’s Head, as well as a number of shorter performed works. As actor; A Midsummer Night's Dream, No Reservations, Lysistrata, Bad Samaritans Go Places, The Lost Rider. Director of People In The Sun, Mea Culpa, Dog’s Dinner and Provenance Helpline (for Royal Academy of Arts).  Producer for Strutting and Fretting, No Reservations, Launching Pad and Paintings By Playwrights. Interviewee in LWT's The Monocled Dandy.

Clare-Louise English (Assistant director, technical operation) graduated from LAMDA in 2000, and got her first role as Madelina in The Dead House at Para, for BBC Radio 4. She is a regular contributor at RITE2STAGE, for whom she was heard as Samantha Jane in New Jeans.  Her new play, The Lock In, was recently given its first work-shop reading.

 Chris Yun (Assistant Director, lighting design, technical operation) Studied under Valerie Lucas at University of Surrey, Roehampton. She is an accomplished performer, director and designer with work in England, Scotland and Korea. She also worked in Jim Grover's production of Paintings by Playwrights.    

PoL Steele A former community worker, PoL Steele is a disabled self taught artist and web designer based in Edinburgh, Scotland.
Self-taught in IT since only January 1999, PoL has since risen to become one of Scotland's most prominent webmasters, founding a series of record breaking international events including The Edinburgh International Internet Festival (E.I.I.Festival 1999 to 2004) and The Gathering: Scotland's Millennium Arts Project. Both projects, featuring thousands of artists between them, are now considered to be the largest international artistic events in Scottish Internet History! He is also responsible for the virtual and "real-world stage" premieres of  Glass Hero.  

NOTES ON DIRECTING A FORGOTTEN HERO 
It is my general rule not to direct my own work. I know some writers fail to trust directors to transfer their precious words to the stage. It is a parallel to a defendant representing himself in court, clarity can most usually be exposed by an impartial observer. That being said, I have had little choice but to direct my plays on two occasions. The first was for a revival of Provenance Helpline as a sideshow for an exhibition at Royal Academy of Arts, the second for the first performance of Glass Hero, both dictated by time restraints. 

Having played around with the Grayson script for a couple of years, I had it clear in my mind what I wanted. The most important aspect was that the only reality in the narrative should be Grayson, a wandering memory of lost opportunities. What is more, given the opening premise that Victor has "lost himself" through his unexplained disappearance, this wanderer is prone to false memory syndrome. The conflicting characters of Victor, different when seen through the eyes of each character and confused when speaking for himself, is a combination of my own invention and snatches of real speeches by Grayson, Tony Benn and Fidel Castro. 

What was I to make of a play for a new and untried Edinburgh theatre space with no lighting (we would be provided with mobile rigs), a set to be acquired and assembled a week before the first performance and a budget determined after the event by the box office takings (cast and crew on profit-share terms). 

Problems? Of course there were problems. Accommodation upstairs in the swanky venue fell through due to fears over the "change of use" of our sleeping in a listed building and its effect upon insurers. PoL (who deserves the highest billing on these credits, being the first to recognise the potential of on-line playwriting; he posted Glass Hero on the first Edinburgh International Internet Festival, has linked to and promoted my subsequent plays and has now run full-circle  by producing this play "in the real world") and his good friends immediately provided bedding space, sofas and keys to their doors for my cast and crew. Health and Safety checks, fire inspection, local committee meetings on the future of the building, an embargo on any scenery painting; all above and beyond the accepted norms for fringe productions and yet none the less interesting for all that. The result? A fantastic couple of weeks in Edinburgh. And so Grayson lived again and staggered drunkenly on to greater things!  

I was privileged to meet Tony Benn, one of the inspirations for my building of Grayson's character, in March and again in April 2006. Among other topics, we spoke briefly about Victor Grayson and how history repeats itself. I do not have the stomach for another tragedy, but I am ready and willing to present a farce. 

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