Wild Time by Rose Biggin and Keir Cooper - The Theatrical Bookclub

Helloooo!!

Last year one of my favourite novellas was Wild Time by Rose Biggin and Keir Cooper REVIEWED HERE . This story is a reworking of a midsummer night’s dream but with a focus on the fae part of the story i.e. the best bit. modern elements sneak in, the amazons have a hen night and even heavenly bodies play a part. It is smart, bawdy, funny and seductive and i highly recommend it.

In this weird time of UK lockdown, I was not expecting to hear any more news after publication. But it has come to my attention that there will be a special online theatrical bookclub on 25/2. I was intrigued and so asked the authors for some more information!

SO, WHAT IS A THEATRICAL BOOKCLUB?

Good question.

You start by buying a ticket on the theatre website - so our first one is with the lovely folk at Camden People’s Theatre in London (a space we both have history with). The ticket will mean 2 things. First you’ll be sent a copy of the theatrical novel WILD TIME in the post - and if you were to buy soon you’d have 2 weeks or so to read it. (It’s a quick read at 200 pages!)

Next - you’ll be invited via a Zoom link to attend a chat with us at 8:30 on Feb 25th, talking with director and dramaturg Emma Jude Harris who the theatre hooked us up with as an exciting match to discuss this kind of work. The audience will be part of the conversation and there’ll be space to commune with fellow readers and discuss things that come up from WILD TIME, a bit like we’re all at the bar after a show - or also, like we’re at an author talk/bookclub. It’ll be casual and friendly, and hopefully it will also take us to some interesting places! If you log in and would rather just watch, that will be fine too. Theatre audiences and bookclubs alike may well be calling out for social spaces for being and enjoying work with a sense of togetherness.

The book is a radical adaptation of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream and what else makes this book particularly theatrical is the people who made it (us - we both have theatre practices), our host Emma who is a director-researcher, the venue being a theatre (albiet a digital host), and we imagine some of the audience. But straight-up book lovers will not be disappointed. We’ve a firm foot in each medium.

HOW DID THIS IDEA COME ABOUT?

We were thinking of ways to promote WILD TIME, which as we’ve said, is a radical adaptation of a play. As Covid has kept everything shut including the theatres we wanted to partner with a venue to offer something that differed from livestreamed performance, but could equally bring people together and be thought about in similar terms to theatre while the lights are dark.

DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA WHERE THE CONVERSATION WILL LEAD?

Emma’s background is working as a director and dramaturg, she’s very interested in questions to do with the boundaries of form, dismantling notions of genre, decolonising the canon - so it may centre around these angles perhaps. Or you can easily get talking about how big fairies are - or anything really. Ultimately we’re in it for the wit and jokes and hope this will spill out to the talk too!

WHEN THE WORLD ONE DAY GETS BACK TO NORMAL WOULD YOU LIKE TO SEE WILD TIME PERFORMED?

That’s a really interesting question - our first thought is we’ve no idea how that would work!

Nina Allan said WILD TIME’s decisions result in “a work that almost demands to be adapted for the stage” - it’s very much a book *about* theatre, so these questions do seem to be in the air… maybe someone at the bookclub will have an idea??

In the book-performance realm, Rose really loves doing live readings, and we were planning that when there was going to be a more physical launch. She’d totally love to read a bit of this to an in-person audience sometime.

ANY FUTURE PROJECTS IN STORE AND WHERE CAN WE HEAR MORE?

We’ll be setting up more ‘A Theatrical Novel at…..’ bookclub events with more theatres, and posting about those on Twitter, that’s probably the best place to follow us!

@rosebiggin | @asweetniche | @CamdenPT

FOR MORE INFORMATION ON THIS EVENT PLEASE VISIT

https://www.cptheatre.co.uk/production/wild-time-a-theatrical-novel-at-cpt/