Interview: Writer and Director Lisa Nicoll

BroadwayWorld caught up with writer and director Lisa Nicoll to chat about bringing Other Side of the River to audiences.

Tell us a bit about Other Side of the River and the inspiration behind writing it?

Other Side of the River originally came about as part of the Paisley 2021 City of Culture bid. I was approached to be part of this bid to write a play for In Motion Theatre, and tour it around Scotland, inspired by the Ferguslie Park community in Paisley.

There'd been a lot of negativity in the press (newspapers and on social media) when it was rated one of the worst places to live in Scotland because of the Scottish Multiple Deprivation Index and other government statistics. The news didn't help, showing photos of boarded up streets in the area, and saying that there was a lot of unemployment and laziness from the people who lived there/ But none of the articles talked to the people of Ferguslie Park - it was all just based on statistics and population reports.

One of the things the bid wanted me to do was to get to know the people of Ferguslie Park, find out the true story behind the headlines: who are the people being told they're not good enough by people who don't even know them? How can we make people visible for who they are and not just be a sensationalised headline?

I've been embedding myself in the Ferguslie Park community for the last five years. The play was initially meant to tour in 2020 but obviously due to covid that got delayed. That led us to do even more engagement online with the community. I did a series of writing workshops with a lot of the people there and we recorded monologues that they'd written which I helped script edit and develop. Professional actors recorded the pieces (including stars from Outlander and Scot Squad) and we put those out as podcasts on our website and through our virtual programme for the community. This allowed great friendships to build up.

One of the key friendships was with Pat Kidd who had written a piece through my workshop, which encouraged him to keep writing. I worked with him to develop a book called 'Cardboard on the Sole of My Shoe' which we've just got published. It's short stories about him growing up in Ferguslie Park and the adversities that happen, but also how people overcome them and that's what's really important. That's what the play's about - how do people overcome things, how do people deal with things in a moment rather than just being negative and saying 'we can't do that'.

What's so inspirational about Ferguslie Park is that people here find solutions - they're not just sitting and complaining on their backsides. That's what a lot of people do; just wait for somebody to come up with a solution. So, for example, they've got an amazing community market where you pay £2.50 and you can get £20 of food. All of this comes from food waste. They've got chest freezers full of food that's come from FareShare, local supermarkets, local businesses and cupboards filled with tinned food. Even places like Greggs and Nandos give the food that they have left over! People can come to the market and feel valued. The market is tackling a really big issue (food waste) and when you don't have a lot, it makes you feel like you do have a lot. I think so many people in society can learn from what Ferguslie Park are doing.

Within the play, there's a storyline where the characters have a Bingo Bus/Van just like the one Ferguslie Park had during Covid. It toured around the community taking Bingo to the streets and helped to deliver food from the community market or other surplus food to people who maybe don't have so much. The van in the play breaks down and part of the storyline tackles how they are going to get it back on the road and get to the people who need their help.

That's all set against the backdrop of a young journalist going into this small town as someone who is desperate for a story to make her feel noticed. Beth's living in a city where she's feeling really lonely and isolated. Her friends are all getting married or having kids or getting new jobs. Meanwhile, her Dad is about to pass away from lung cancer and she wants to bag a story to make him proud and make her feel visible. She goes into this town, Ailm, which she's been told is the worst place to live. It's a fictional town inspired by Ferguslie Park, but there is a universal story to it all. When Beth arrives, she's desperate to find out all the bad stuff that happens there, but she gets so welcomed into the community that she feels part of something for the first time and feels like she belongs. Andy, the taxi driver, really takes her under his wing. He's inspired by Pat Kidd who I mentioned earlier. Pat's a taxi driver in real life. He has dyslexia and was always ridiculed by people all of his life, so to write this book we wrote together meant a lot to him, and to have based one of the play's main characters on him as well feels really fitting.

Who would you like to come and see it?
We want everybody to come and see Other Side of the River - it's not about a set audience, it's about making stuff accessible to everybody. That's one of my main drivers for the play. We don't want to pigeonhole anybody and want it to be an opportunity for everyone to mix together. We're making it accessible by taking work to lots of different places and making the ticket price flexible (it's pay-what-you-can starting at £2.50)

What would you like audiences to take away from it?

I want the audience to come and feel part of something. I want them to feel part of a gathering. Part of thinking 'actually we shouldn't judge people til we get to know them'. I want people to come away feeling that they've had a good night out, that they feel connected to people and really have a snapshot into other people's lives that is so positive that we maybe stop and think about how we spend our money and how we're connecting with people rather than just through technology.

I also want people to come away thinking 'maybe I'm not going to waste so much food' or 'maybe I'm going to find ways of engaging with and using food waste places'. Sometimes people think food waste schemes or community cafes have to be places where you don't have any money - there's stigma attached to that, but there shouldn't be. What we're trying to do is to make things better so that we've got a much more sustainable food chain as well - I know that's quite a lot to aim for! If we can make people think differently and help others have fun in life, and show that you can overcome obstacles in adversity, I'll be happy. Sometimes people can bury their head in the sand but these characters are just getting on with it. How do we encourage others to get on with it and find their own solutions?

How important is it for the show to be involved with communities and how are communities getting involved?

It's so important that the show was inspired by communities. It's not a community piece of theatre - it's a mainstream piece of theatre but one which engages with people that often don't go to the theatre, can't afford to or it's not accessible to them. We're making it accessible by taking it into communities so it's on their doorstep, that they feel part of it, that it belongs to them. We've also been doing journalism workshops with young people, and teaming up with community cafes and larders to provide cooking demonstrations in the communities we're bringing the play to.

I've been going out to every area the play's touring to - going to their warm spaces, their community cafes, their set lunches - to get to know folk, because all too often people think 'why are people not coming to my show' and it's because they've not got to know the people they want in the room. It's so important to get to know people in a media-heavy culture, and to bring people together because when we do live in bigger cities at times, it can make us feel more distant and apart from each other.

This production is something different because it brings people together. Not just to watch a theatre piece but it gives them food that's been made from food waste, it gives them an experience, bingo which is incorporated into the show. We've got community volunteers that'll be serving the food to people because they're volunteering. We've also had community marketing volunteers getting involved who've been our people on the ground helping promote the show, because that familiar face in your community, you're gonna engage with them. That's been really beautiful - to see the word spread about the play in a really natural way.

What makes the way it is performed a bit special?

For me, it's just a different format to how a traditional theatre show is - they'll be sat at tables, they'll have had their soup, they'll watch the show, they can play their game of bingo, they can get involved in the song we've had written especially for the show. It just brings people together and make people go 'Is this not the way we should be more often?'.

I want people to come away just feeling good about themselves because of connectedness and being with other people and having a good old get together like old-fashioned new year's parties. I'm worried that we can lose that personal connection and we don't want to lose that because we're humans, we're not robots. We shouldn't be machines. Yes, we're using machines but we've got to be so careful that we don't become machines ourselves.

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Other Side of the River tours from Friday 14 April - Sunday 8 May to communities across Scotland. All dates and tickets are available here. It is presented by In Motion Theatre in association with OneRen and funded by Future Paisley.

Photo credit: Robin Mitchell

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