mysterious-wts

[mysterious-wts]

Letters of support for the project

[mysterious-wts]

Mysterious - The Journey Of Writing The Show (18.10.23)

January 2022 - RCS and Cabaret’s

The writing team behind mysterious met when Colum and Coggin (who were then RCS MA Musical Theatre students) worked with Sarah on a new writing module in early 2022. Through working on this module project, they found a shared style and passion for creating queer and neurodivergent inclusive work. They also worked later in the year with Sarah on a cabaret module where Sarah directed and offered feedback and guidance on both of their individually written pieces. With all of them having an interest in each other's writing style, they decided to work together on a new project. 

September 2022 - Fife and Denmark

After the MA’s finished their course studies, the team had a short stay in Fife to begin work and gather inspiration from some local locations, lore and history. This left them in good stead for their first residency at Mindgarden Arts Centre, Denmark. It was here that what we now know as Mysterious was born. Determined to create exciting new theatre that was not only intended to have space for non-binary and neurodivergent characters and actors, but built from the ground up to have these performers at its centre, we began the long arduous task of creating a new world for these characters to live in. (If you’d like to see more of the characters and world, check out our content page in the link below!)

January 2023 - First Sharing

On the anniversary of the team first meeting each other, the team held a small sharing in London. With a little gathering of friends and personal industry contacts, the team gathered round a piano in a friends livingroom and shared the heart of our piece. Tears were shed, feedback was shared, and emotions ran high. We knew from just how moved our little audience was that we were onto something - that we had the potential to really make change with this. 

May & June 2023 - The Glasgow Sessions

After a short period of working remotely on the show and its material, the team spent two weeks in Glasgow continuing work, and preparing material for our upcoming workshops with BYMT. These sessions were really where progress started to steam roll. Between a lot of cups of coffee (the and occasional vodka tonic) the world of Mysterious was finally in a place where we could start to play with these characters in the real world, and with real actors! August 2023 - BYMT

Mysterious’ BYMT residency was an honour, and it was nerve-wracking! Finally having people outside of the team physically engaging with the material was a scary thought, but an exciting one - and it payed off. We knew from early on in the building of our characters that we wanted adults to play the teen cast, but we needed to workshop the characters with actual teens. We needed to see what parts of the show delighted teens, what lyrics and words felt right or wrong in their style of speech. The whole process was tiring and high stakes, but in the end was so rewarding and so exciting to finally share some of the material in a public setting!

September 2023 - Mindgarden (Here We Go Again!)

After BYMT we were left with a LOT of new thoughts and ideas, so we jetted off back to Denmark for our second residency at Mindgarden Arts Centre, Denmark. A few more character adjustments and a lot of new story beats and here we are today, and ready for the next step in our own adventure! Keep an eye on this space for updates as we continue to explore the world and characters of Mysterious! Want to hear more? Click the link below to go back to our launch pad, where you can listen to some of the music demos, read some plot and character content, or check out the creatives on the team!