Writing Exercises

Emma Dennis-Edwards is a Writer/Performer of Jamaican and Trinidadian heritage.

Emma’s play BRICKS which she wrote as part of the Old Vic 12 was shortlisted for the Alfred Fagon Award in 2020. In 2018 Emma’s play Funeral Flowers (which Emma wrote and stars in) was performed at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2018 and won the Scotsman’s Fringe First Award and the Filipa Bragança award for best female solo performance. It has since enjoyed sold-out London transfers to The Bunker, Free Word Centre, Bernie Grant Arts Centre, The Roundhouse and Hackney Empire.

In addition to her writing for theatre, Emma also writes for television; she was selected for the BBC Studios Writers Academy 2019 and has written episodes of EastEnders and Holby City.

Writing Exercise One:

Everyone needs to complete the sentence “If I were Prime Minister…” and continue writing. This is a free writing exercise so let your pen and imagination flow. This might be you writing from a more personal level, a list, or even creating a manifesto allow this exercise to take you wherever it takes you.

Writing Exercise Two:

World Map, I want us to think about our journeys to here. Physically as well as spiritually.

I would like you to make a list based on my questions:

· Where are you now?

· Where was your first family home?

· Where were your born?

· Where was your mother born?

· Where was your father born?

· Where was the first place you visited away from where you were born?

· Where would you like to visit?

· Where do you feel safe

Taking one of those questions, see what you have written. Think about the location that intrigues you the most and choose a character who might exist in this space. Write a monologue in this character’s voice. Set a time limit (I would say 20 minutes max) and see where you get to.

Miriam Battye shares a three-part writing exercise that you can try at home.

Miriam Battye is a writer from Manchester. Her play, Scenes with girls, premiered in the Jerwood Theatre Upstairs in 2020. Miriam was the first Sister Pictures Writer in Residence in 2018 and has various original ideas in development for television.

Something I think about, and refer to a lot, is the ‘dream’ of the play I am about to write. What is the dream of the play?

If this sounds a little bit untechnical, strange and emotional, it’s because, yeah, it is. And I am.

To me, a play does not happy fully in the imagination, or on the page, or on the stage, it happens in between these three spaces, and I like to think of this as a dream space. When I am lost or irritated with my play, I try and return to that dream.

As well as being a sensory space, something you can feel (I can often feel a play a bit), a dream also refers to your hopes or aspirations, for your play, for yourself or for the world you occupy. I like that double-meaning, I find that useful.

I don’t think you could come up with a dream for a play in an exercise, however here’s a 3 part exercise that might help you think about how you can translate a dream or idea into something that actually happens on the page, and on the stage.

Set a timer for a minute. Spend a minute on each of the following lists:

Things that frighten me

Things that piss me off

Things that give me hope

Things I want to understand

Now, put that to the side.

Write a list of ACTS OF the following words. For example, an ACT OF love, might be a kiss, or cutting the burnt bits off someone’s toast, or killing someone’s shithead neighbour for them. Some of these may seem a little harder to grasp than others, but go with it.

Love

Violence

Compassion

War

Loneliness

Revenge

Mortality

Rage

Youth

Pain

Courage

Mothering

Survival

Fuck it

Now go back to your other list. Choose what of the things that frighten you, give you hope, piss you off, want to understand, that you are most drawn to and write an ACT OF that thing.

If you put that ACT OF something into a space with characters, you may have the beginnings of a scene about something you care about. And if you think about that act as a centrepoint for a play or a character’s journey, and build around it, you might be able to start building a dream of a play.

Playwright Somalia Nonyé Seaton ran one of our Introduction to Playwriting Groups in 2019. Here she shares an exercise that you can try at home.

Somalia is a Jamaican – Nigerian, British theatre practitioner, playwright and screenwriter. She was born and raised in South-East London and is a 2017 finalist recipient for The Susan Smith Blackburn Award.

Some of her writing credits include: Fall of the Kingdom, Rise of the Footsoldier (RSC); House (Clean Break/ Assembley Rooms, Edinburgh/ The Yard); Crowning Glory (Stratford East); Mama’s Little Angel (The Yard); and RED (Tonic Theatre).

A Writing Exercise

A) Grab a newspaper, choose one story – answer the following questions, where the answers aren’t so obviously outlined in the story – allow yourself to fill in the gaps:

1) What’s happening?
2) Where are we?
3) When is it happening?
4) Who’s story is it? Give them a name.
5) What do they want?
6) What’s preventing them from getting this?
7) What might they need? (for example – a character might want their friend to protect them, though they might need courage)
8) What’s at stake?
9) Are there other characters you can identify?
10) What is their relationship to our main character?
11) What do they want?

B) So you have identified what’s happening and who its happening to. Now explore this moment further, in a scene.

Some rules:
1) The scene must begin with the line “You’re going to break that if you don’t stop”, and end with “Now you’ll understand”.
2) Something must be revealed to one of our characters

Playwright Stef Smith ran one of our Introduction to Playwriting Groups in 2019. Here she shares an exercise that you can try at home.

Stef Smith is an multi award-winning writer working to international acclaim.

Work includes: Enough, Girl In The Machine, Swallow (Traverse Theatre); Nora: A Doll’s House (Glasgow Citizen’s Theatre); The Song Project and Human Animals (Royal Court); Acts Of Resistance(Headlong / Bristol Old Vic) and Remote (National Theatre Connections Festival).

Most recently Stef was a finalist for the Susan Smith Blackburn prize, which is the largest prize for women writing in the english language. Stef has won three Scotsman Fringe First Awards for Roadkill, Swallow and Enough. Roadkill also won an Olivier Award for Outstanding Achievement in an Affiliate Theatre.

A Writing Exercise

Traditionally when we think of a play, we think of people talking. We might think of dialogue or monologue. But, some of my favourite playwrights utilise something else to make drama – silence.

• So, take two characters – A and B (you can also give them names, if that helps). Think of their relationship and now think of a conflict between them. Perhaps one wants something from the other or perhaps one has already taken something and is trying to keep it a secret or think of a conflict entirely of your creation. Write a scene centred around that conflict, but that scene can only be 20 lines of dialogue (10 said by each character).
• Then, copy and paste the dialogue but remove 3 lines of dialogue and replace them with silence. Leaving your scene with only 17 lines of dialogue.
• Then, copy and paste this new versions of the dialogue but remove a further 7 lines of dialogue and replace them with silence. Leaving your scene with only 10 lines of dialogue.
• Then, copy and paste this new versions of the dialogue but remove a further 5 lines of dialogue and replace them with silence. Leaving your scene with only 5 lines of dialogue.

You now have 4 versions of the same scene. Reflect on each of them and see how silence has added too (or indeed, subtracted) from the dramatic tension. It’s a chance to see how little you might need in order to write a conflict or potentially, it has revealed something about one of the characters. This is an exercise you can also use in pre-existing writing (if you have some) to help you edit and really earn those dramatic moments.

Playwright Jasmine Lee-Jones shares an exercise that you can try at home

Jasmine Lee-Jones debut play seven methods of killing kylie jenner was first commissioned as part of the Royal Court’s Young Court programme and had a sold out run in the Jerwood Theatre Upstairs in 2019. Jasmine received the Alfred Fagon Award and the Evening Standard Theatre Award for Most Promising Playwright, and has been nominated in the 2020 Olivier Awards for the play.
 

This is less an exercise one person has showed me and more a composite of a couple of different suggestions and thoughts I’ve picked up from some amazing theatre artists over the years.

I call this exercise ‘THE WORST PLAY EVER’

As a writer I spend a lot of time being fearful. Fearful the play as it exists in my head will not be the thing that makes it down onto paper, that in some way my mind will mess it up and it will get lost in translation. At drama school, my teacher Martin referred to that voice as “the little fucker” and I think it exists in writing too! Instead of ignoring this feeling of fear I’ve devised an exercise to not only get all of those horrid thoughts out but also put them to use.

I think this exercise is particularly useful if you are either early into a first draft or haven’t written one yet but have a kernel of what your play may – or in this case – may not be.

• Set yourself a timer of 3 minutes. In that time write down every possible thing that could go wrong with your play. Think clichés, plot holes, bad lines, or any words that might come to mind, in the random order it comes in your head, in some ways the more scattered the better.
• When the timer has come to a stop, take a deep inhale of fear and when you exhale it out make sure it’s gone for good.
• Now it’s time to get to work. Take a look at what you’ve written and pick out any phrases, words or lines that stick out. When you have a couple that you like, hone it down to one.
• Double the time you had on the timer before and now take 6 minutes to write anything that comes to mind based on that one word or line prompt you have plucked from the previous free writing. It might end up feeling like dialogue or a conversation in a scene but don’t force it if it’s not coming. It might just be a continued moment to explore what comes of following your writing instincts.
• When 6 minutes has come to a stop take another deep breath and then exhale. Have a look at what you’ve written. You might think it’s completely rubbish but if there’s anything in it – keep it! If you have the impulse to write more, perhaps in an even more structured capacity do! If not, you can now throw it away forever safe in the knowledge that you have written the worst thing possible and now you can write what you actually want to write!

Sabrina Mahfouz is a playwright, poet, screenwriter and performer. In 2019 she ran one of our Introduction to Playwriting Groups with Rory Mullarkey.

Her work includes A History of Water in the Middle East at the Royal Court which has also been produced as an audio play. 

Sabrina has been elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and is the recipient of the 2018 King’s Alumni Arts & Culture Award for inspiring change in the industry.

She has won a Sky Arts Academy Award for Poetry, a Westminster Prize for New Playwrights, a BBC Radio & Music Award for Best Drama Production and a Fringe First Award.

A Writing Exercise

Yeh, scripts need subtext. But really, British theatre, that much subtext?? I think it is subjective rather than an absolute prerequisite to ‘good’ theatre, ‘good’ obviously being subjective in itself.

I’m not as taken by subtextual tension as most seem to be, but I do admire the technicality of it and understand that how much it might be needed differ according to the form of theatre being created.

My experience in certain areas of life with certain people have been – they say what they damn well mean and the drama comes from having to deal with that level of truth!

So for this little exercise at least, as a challenge against what every single playwriting book or course would ever tell you, in these times when breaking the rules is pretty necessary, really – forget subtext.

1. Play a song, any song.
   For the duration of that song, imagine there is somebody- real or fictional, who you know or don’t – near enough for you to see, but the song is so loud wherever you are that you could say anything to them and they wouldn’t have a clue. Say everything you have ever wanted to say to this person – good, bad, ugly. Stop exactly when the song stops, even if mid-sentence.

    

2. Play a completely different song.
   And for the duration of that song, imagine things the other way round. The person has a lot to say to you, too (either the real you, imaginary you, combination of both) – but they know you can’t hear them over the music. Make sure at least some of that is good stuff though, as times are tough enough right now! Write as that person until the song plays out.

Forget trying to be ‘clever’ for once, this is just a stream of what you’d never really say but now you’re saying it and there’s no hiding, no softening, no censoring – from either side. Maybe some of the thoughts or lines from either side might spark some ideas for what you’d really like to write about and you can take what you need from this and go on to craft something with as much, or as little, subtext as you wish!

Leo Butler has been writing for the stage since his Royal Court debut Made of Stone in 2000. His other plays include Redundant; Lucky Dog; All You Need is LSD; I’ll be the Devil; and Boy.  He was also the Royal Court’s Writers Tutor between 2006 and 2014.

I’ve been working with a wonderful group of writers since September last year, bringing together some of the most exciting new writers in the country.  Most of the group have already been produced, but they are still at the start of their careers.  Our aim is to support these writers in writing a brand new play from conception to first draft via a myriad of rough drafts, false-starts, epiphanies and crises.  One of the joys, for me, is seeing how the group bond and create their own support network over the weeks and months.  Writing is a lonely business sometimes and you often only have yourself to guide you through the various psychological and practical pitfalls.  It’s a gift to have a group of writers who can give you advice, notes or a pat on the back when you most need it.

I always try to encourage openness in the sessions, ‘the right to fail’, or ‘the right to be crap’.  I ask the writers to read and share their work even when it’s at its most rough or unformed – sometimes you may not know what it is you’re writing yet, sometimes you might be writing several plays at once.  I make it a rule that no scene or script goes beyond the room and that we are all allowed to be rubbish, to accept the fact that it sometimes takes pages of shit dialogue before you put down anything good.  As group leader – I’m no teacher -, I always make sure I bring in something half-finished of my own to share as well.  And, in truth, nothing the writers ever bring is shit anyway – it may not be finished, but it’s never bad.

I like the sessions to be practical.  Reading a new script aloud, hot-seating, making a model-box of the play you’re writing, improvising scenes that haven’t been written yet  – (writers are better actors than you might think) – and sometimes actual writing in the sessions (as sometimes it’s the only time in the week the writers have).

I love the writers in the group.  They’re so smart and talented and they all have something unique and brilliant and provocative to put on stage.  They think deeply about the theatre as a form, as an art, an instrument for change, and as an institution.  They’re inspiring to me, and I know they’re going to blow our minds and shape the future of new writing.

It’s been very sad to not be able to meet up with them in person all since the lock-down.   But we’ve been meeting every week on Zoom.  Once we get over the technical glitches and the excitement of seeing everyone’s living rooms, we have managed to have discussions about the current crisis, and to begin sharing work and helping each other move forward again.

Writing Exercise

I was asked to share something here that I might give to the group. So here’s some notes on writing a scene.

It doesn’t matter how much you want to change the world or how big and bold your concept is – if you can’t crack writing a scene of dialogue with characters and relationships then you’re going to struggle. I’m not saying that every play has to be about characters/relationships and there aren’t a million different forms and styles of theatre, but you can’t be a Kung Fu master until you’ve learnt how to stand up straight either.

Start with a two-hander to begin with.

If two characters know each other (even just a little bit) then you have a history to draw on. They already have expectations, false expectations, desires, fears, etc about each other. (When you write for strangers, everything becomes a surprise and it can get very boring very quickly.

I know its boring/conventional blah blah, but characters in scene generally are trying to get or to do something to each other. You’ll have a much better time writing if you let at least one of your characters enter the scene with a motivation.

To find a motivation quickly for your first scene make it a special occasion – a job interview, birthday, a first or second date, a reunion, a honeymoon, a break-up, buying a pair of new shoes, a meeting of terrorists, a meeting between parent and teacher, a fight or a shag between friends. ANYTHING YOU WANT, just give the scene a reason to be alive. It doesn’t have to be King Lear or anything, it can be about something small and seemingly insignificant.

As its drama, decide what’s wrong about the special occasion. What’s bothering the characters? Are they bothered just a little bit because they don’t like the dress they’re wearing? Are they bothered/unhappy, but they don’t know why yet? Are they bothered because they just killed a dog? Are they bothered because they’re in love with someone else? Are they bothered because they want to have the best night of their lives and their friends are late? Are they bothered because their partner isn’t listening to them? Are they bothered because they feel guilt or are angry about something? ANYTHING YOU WANT, just give the scene some anxiety, a reason to move.

Make the thing that’s wrong relate in some way to the meeting of the two characters. It doesn’t have to directly relate, but it might.

Decide where you want to set the scene. Private locations give you more freedom in my experience (someone’s personal territory), but public locations can be fun (workplaces, bars, etc.). It depends on what you IMAGINE, and the kind of pace or energy you want.

Just write, and let it be rough. Every good scene you’ve seen or read will have gone through countless rewrites and rehearsals.

Playwright Jasmine Lee-Jones shares an exercise that you can try at home

Jasmine Lee-Jones debut play seven methods of killing kylie jenner was first commissioned as part of the Royal Court’s Young Court programme and had a sold out run in the Jerwood Theatre Upstairs in 2019. Jasmine received the Alfred Fagon Award and the Evening Standard Theatre Award for Most Promising Playwright, and has been nominated in the 2020 Olivier Awards for the play.
 

This is less an exercise one person has showed me and more a composite of a couple of different suggestions and thoughts I’ve picked up from some amazing theatre artists over the years.

I call this exercise ‘THE WORST PLAY EVER’

As a writer I spend a lot of time being fearful. Fearful the play as it exists in my head will not be the thing that makes it down onto paper, that in some way my mind will mess it up and it will get lost in translation. At drama school, my teacher Martin referred to that voice as “the little fucker” and I think it exists in writing too! Instead of ignoring this feeling of fear I’ve devised an exercise to not only get all of those horrid thoughts out but also put them to use.

I think this exercise is particularly useful if you are either early into a first draft or haven’t written one yet but have a kernel of what your play may – or in this case – may not be.

Set yourself a timer of 3 minutes. In that time write down every possible thing that could go wrong with your play. Think clichés, plot holes, bad lines, or any words that might come to mind, in the random order it comes in your head, in some ways the more scattered the better.

When the timer has come to a stop, take a deep inhale of fear and when you exhale it out make sure it’s gone for good.

Now it’s time to get to work. Take a look at what you’ve written and pick out any phrases, words or lines that stick out. When you have a couple that you like, hone it down to one.

Double the time you had on the timer before and now take 6 minutes to write anything that comes to mind based on that one word or line prompt you have plucked from the previous free writing. It might end up feeling like dialogue or a conversation in a scene but don’t force it if it’s not coming. It might just be a continued moment to explore what comes of following your writing instincts.

When 6 minutes has come to a stop take another deep breath and then exhale. Have a look at what you’ve written. You might think it’s completely rubbish but if there’s anything in it – keep it! If you have the impulse to write more, perhaps in an even more structured capacity do! If not, you can now throw it away forever safe in the knowledge that you have written the worst thing possible and now you can write what you actually want to write!

Rachel De-lahay shares a writing exercise that you can try at home. 

Rachel De–lahay debut play The Westbridge won the 2012 Writers Guild Award for Best Play as well as coming joint first for the 2011 Alfred Fagon Award. Rachel’s second play Routes opened in the Jerwood Theatre Upstairs in 2013 and won her the 2013 Charles Wintour Award for Most Promising Playwright.

In television, Rachel has written for The Feed for Amazon, Kiri for Channel 4 / The Forge,  Noughts + Crosses for BBC, and The Eddy for Netflix.

She is co-curator of the festival My White Best Friend (and Other Letters Left Unsaid).

The best advice I was given was – if you can have such a luxury – concentrate on one thing at a time. This way you’re not stock piling ideas for other projects. You want every brilliant thought, possibility to go into this script – this world. Tomorrow you will be a new person with new ideas. Do not try to save anything – make this the best thing it can be. And trust, when you eventually move on, you will be able to do it all over again. If anything, completing a brilliantly packed and nuanced script will be your confidence boost.

Another great gem, for when the script gets hard and moving forward feels overwhelming, write the scenes that excite you – the planned showdown, the dramatic ending. Bringing back your joy will bring back your confidence to sort the rest. 

Both of these nuggets would have been given to me at 3am, in my old kitchen, by my brilliant last flatmate Charlotte Lowdell, who’d come down for a midnight snack and find me just staring at a white screen. A writer and actress herself, she’d alway come with the most logical and calming advice and I was always so thankful to have her around.

When there’s no plan and the blank page is terrifying, the best thing that keeps me writing is setting up circumstances in advance. I like rules. I like to know the boundaries I can play within. I always try versions of the following three examples and set my timer for 5 minutes and then just write. 

–                A is in a room. B enters, A stands… write

–                A and B are sat. A laughs, B stays silent. A stops… write

–                A and B enter a room to find C stood. B turns to leave. A stops them… write

This will be some variation of an exercise I picked up in Leo Butler’s writing group. Leo loved a list, logical exercises and so, in turn, I loved Leo.

Playwright Rory Mullarkey ran one of our Introduction to Playwriting Groups with Sabrina Mahfouz in 2019. Here he shares an exercise that you can try at home.

Rory Mullarkey’s work for the Royal Court includes Pity, The Wolf From the Door and the translation of Remembrance Day.

He has won awards including the James Tait Black Prize for Drama and The George Devine Award for Most Promising Playwright (both 2014); and he was also the recipient of the Harold Pinter Commission in 2015.

In addition to his own work, Rory is a translator of Russian and Ukrainian drama, and has translated plays for the Royal Court Theatre, the National Theatre and the Free Theatre of Belarus.

A Writing Exercise

Find somewhere quiet to write, and something to write on.

Now imagine two people. Give them names, or don’t. Start them talking to each other.

After three lines of dialogue, write a stage direction: make the characters do something, have something happen, change the world a bit, or make another character appear.

Now write three more lines of dialogue.

Now write another stage direction.

Now three more lines.

Now another stage direction.

Keep that rhythm. Keep writing, keep making stuff happen. Drama isn’t just talking, it’s events. Three lines, then a stage direction. Three lines, then a stage direction. Don’t pause, don’t edit, don’t think. Write for twenty-five minutes. Then stop. Look back over what you’ve written. Hopefully, at least once, you’ll have surprised yourself. Hold onto that. If you surprise yourself, then you’ll surprise the audience.