Steve Wright looks forward to another piping-hot selection of new plays from Theatre West.

Every autumn since 2003, Theatre West – who’ve championed and brought on new writing in the city since 1990 – have produced an autumn season at the Alma Tavern. This has meant that, each year, five brand new scripts by local playwrights get selected, from a vast pool of submissions, then developed, rehearsed and produced, each for a fortnight’s run. This annual smorgasbord of new writing has become a bolted-down highlight of Venue’s theatrical year, for the excitement of seeing the freshest, sharpest new writing, simply, eloquently and cannily staged in the Alma’s intimate black-box space.

This year, the season is in place as usual – but the manner of its creation has been a little different. Instead of inviting scripts from all comers, Theatre West – aka co-founders Ann Stiddard and Alison Comley – invited 50 of their favourite local playwrights to write a piece inspired by a photograph, randomly assigned.

It all started last winter, when Alison was on her annual end-of-season jaunt to her beloved Berlin. At a city market, she found a stall heaving with old photographs, many of them black and white or sepia, all of unknown origins. “It was fascinating looking through and wondering, ‘who are these people, what were these stories?’,” Alison recalls now. The idea came to her that these images could form the visual stimuli for the next season’s plays. “I spent a cold hour on the pavement choosing photos – I thought we’d need a good mix, of landscapes and scenes as well as faces.”

The next stage was to send out an invitation to 50 selected writers to come to the Alma one winter evening, and select a picture (all hidden in envelopes, so no peeking) as their jumping-off point. Ann: “Writing can be a solitary lifestyle, so it was great to see all the writers together at the Alma that evening. Some were really happy with what they’d picked: others refused to look at them, wanting to wait till they sat down to write.”

Then came a weekend in May, for which the 50 writers each sent in the first 10 pages they’d completed, with all 50 excerpts being performed script-in-hand over the weekend in front of Alison, Ann, a panel of judges and members of the public. Audiences and panels voted on which scripts they liked. Alison: “Asking people to write a small excerpt, that if selected we would develop, was a good way of doing it. Knowing that we couldn’t possibly stage all 50 scripts, it was a way to involve lots of writers without committing everyone to all the energy and investment of writing a full script.” Even so, performing 50 scripts across a weekend was “like a military operation. But there was a buzz around the Alma all weekend.”

At the end of that weekend, and after votes had been totted up and verdicts exchanged, nine of the 50 excerpts were selected, and the writers asked to convert them into full-length scripts, with support from dramaturgs. Then came another couple of days spent reading the final scripts, and deciding which five would make it to full production. The other four plays will get rehearsed readings at the start of the season.

“It’s been interesting to see how writers have responded to their photos,” Ann reflects. “Some have taken a literal approach, where you can see exactly where in the image the story has come from: others have been more oblique.”

The final five include (and the season kicks off with) ‘The Darkroom’ (4-15 Oct) by Steve Lambert, a fine local playwright whose brilliant ‘Showing the Monster’ was part of Theatre West’s 2009 season. Inspired by an image of a post-war garden party featuring some slightly enforced jollity, Steve’s play is set shortly after World War II, and features a couple – he was a code-breaker during the war, and then suffered a nervous breakdown – living a blameless existence in their country cottage. When a friend visits from London, however, the trio find a box in the air-raid shelter – and its contents are the cue for secrets about our hero’s past to come tumbling out. Elsewhere, Penny Gunter’s ‘Dorian’s Second Life’ (18-29 Oct) is a highly physical, one-man show about a man whose obsession with a certain high-adrenaline sport has had dramatic effects upon his family life.

‘Raising Kamila’ (1-12 Nov), by local poet/playwright Edson Burton, is set on a tugboat on the Rhine, peopled by boat-owner Oskar and his travelling companion Kamila. When Lukas, an artist, comes aboard, their peaceable rhythms are upset and truths are revealed. Alison: “It’s set between the wars, during a disturbing and troubled time in Germany which impacts upon their lives and future plans. It will mean creating a boat for the Alma, which will be a nice challenge!”

Next up is ‘I Remember Green’ (15-26 Nov) by Southwest Scriptwriters member Heather Lister. Ann: “This one explores the relationship between parents and their son who was blinded as a result of a fall, for which the father feels responsible. The writing is very lyrical and poetic, and much is left unsaid about what the torment has done to the parents’ relationship.” The excellent Andy Burden directs this one (he’s joined, in a talented and across-all-ages directing pool, by Pameli Benham, Sita Calvert-Ennals, Amanda Horlock and Ed Viney).

The season’s last play is ‘Sitting with Thistle’ (29 Nov-10 Dec) by Bristol University student Marietta Kirkbride. This one centres on two siblings staying at their grandmother’s house in mid-Wales. All very idyllic, except that a) granny’s just died and b) the siblings are snowed in with the body. Cue a black comedy that unearths the deep-seated relationship issues between the two.

A fine season, in short. All good, meanwhile, on planet Theatre West? “We’re in good health,” Ann beams. “We got Arts Council funding this year for the whole season, at the first time of asking, and we are one of the very few companies actually producing new writing in Bristol. Mike Akers, Natalie McGrath… the list of writers whom we have helped to bring on, and who are now flourishing, is growing. We are giving writers a platform early in their career.” And giving Bristol audiences quality, thought-provoking new writing, year after year.

THE THEATRE WEST SEASON AT THE ALMA TAVERN, BRISTOL BEGINS WITH THE DARKROOM (4-15 OCT). FFI: WWW.ALMATAVERNTHEATRE.CO.UK AND WWW.THEATRE-WEST.CO.UK

Copyright Steve Wright 2011