Edinburgh 2022: The Giant Killers Guest Blog

Guest Blog: Long Lane Theatre Company bring back inspiring, 5-star theatre show to the Fringe

Andrew Pearson-Wright discusses finding and performing true stories with heart

Actor and co-writer of The Giant Killers; Andrew Pearson-Wright blogs for BroadwayWorld about bringing this tear-jerking tale to Edinburgh and why stories from so long ago still resonate with people today.

Eve [-Pearson-Wright; Andrew's wife and co-star] and I were just jobbing actors when we met many years ago, I say jobbing, there was a lot of "resting" too. We were perpetually broke and desperate for an audition and would often find ourselves dreaming of creating our own work. I suppose to begin with we had these pie-in-the-sky dreams that we would write something, and it would find it's way onto Danny Boyles desk and he'd say "this is it! This is what I've been looking for and of course you two must play the leads" so we started writing. I started writing a football script - I'm a football nut, always have been and then I'd bring it to Eve, and she'd sort of pull a face and hand it back to me and say "too much football and it's a bit fantastical" so I went looking for a true story from the world of football. I met a historian at Wembley, and he started talking me through the origins of the F.A. Cup and that's where we found it.

When football had begun it had been a sport for the upper classes, dominated by students from Harrow and Eton. Meanwhile in the North of England, a group of striking mill workers were starting to play this new form of football for the first time. The northern team from Darwen in Lancashire joined the F.A. Cup and ended up going head-to-head with The Old Etonians. It was the first time that workers had gone head-to-head with the wealthy elites, and it captured the nations attention. And to our absolute shock this incredible story that had everything you would want from an underdog tale had never had a dramatic telling before. And so, we set about writing it, it took us a few years and plenty of heated "creative discussions". In truth the play became half their story and half ours. It became about

two people who felt like they'd never had a shot, that worried about losing the roof over their heads, that cared passionately about something that didn't seem to love them back.

When we were writing, my Mum died and that bereavement found its way into their story too. It was the most personal thing either of us had ever shared with an audience. We performed it at the Fringe in 2017, we were in one of the smallest spaces, we feared no one would come, we gave away so many free tickets for the first two performances but then the most amazing thing happened, the audience started connecting with it. It's a story of community, of people standing together and that seemed to resonate so strongly.

The obstacles the town of Darwen overcame are the same obstacles that we've faced, the same most people face; how can you make a difference? Be that to your community or to your own family? Where do you get the drive to keep going when it feels like you are always facing an uphill struggle? I think it's completely normal to find inspiration in the past, if they could do it then so can I.

Getting to come back to the Fringe and share this story again, to give a voice to these characters is so exciting for us. It doesn't feel like a story from the past to us, that's why I think our telling of this story has so much heart, yes, it is the story of Darwen, but it's not just that, it's our story too.

The Giant Killers, Gilded Balloon Teviot (Wine Bar), 12.45pm, 3-29 August (not 16)

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Photo credit: Venus Raven

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