Matt Beames is a writer based in the Southampton area. He is always interested in new commissions, and delights in delivering workshops with schools and youth theatres. He is the Associate Writer of 404 Productions, and is also a founding member of the theatre company Beautiful Shadows. Beames’ gender-reversed version of Sleeping Beauty and his two-act play, Cinderella, which features original songs from David Lewington & Aidan Cooper (music) and Kayleigh Benham (lyrics) are both now available from Aurora Metro Books. They are ideal for an innovative school or youth theatre production, and for those wishing to entertain young audiences with a fresh approach to these much-loved fairytales.
Phil Cleaves: Why theatre?
Matt Beames: Because it's live and it's physical. When somebody isn't saying anything you can hear them – you can hear their physicality. The immediacy of theatre is something you don't get in anything else. It's a unique medium – exciting and live; living and vibrant.
PC: What's been your journey to making theatre?
MB: I got involved in a youth theatre when I was thirteen. I've always wanted to write, and I've always written things. I would write stories off my own bat, not for school, but just because it was something I wanted to do. I wrote a monologue while I was at youth theatre and a friend of mine read it and the director of the youth theatre asked if I wanted to develop it into a one act play, which another member directed as a development thing for both of us. That then went to drama festivals and won some awards. That's where it started for me.
PC: What is a story?
MB: It's a journey that changes you. It changes you if you're the person who's living it or reading it and if you're the person who's hearing or seeing it. I think that's what appeals to me the most about storytelling – a cog shifts slightly in the make-up of your being, you're no longer the person you were before you heard that story or lived that story.
PC: How does the process of discovery as a writer work when adapting stories that have been told over centuries?
MB: Folktales and fairytales are a wonderful thing – there's something beautiful and simple but incredibly complex about them, which is why they're such a joy to work with. But the first step with Sleeping Beauty and Cinderella was burying myself in the hundred different versions of those stories. That gave me a license to find the story I wanted to tell.
PC: Were there lightbulb moments of discovery for you when you were immersed in the stories which drove your interpretation?
MB: Sleeping Beauty is incredibly passive, and that felt absurd in the modern day. We wanted to turn that entirely on its head, we wanted her to be the one trying to solve the problem.
PC: What led you to create Cinderella after that?
MB: Similarly, we wanted Cinderella to be this strong, capable, competent, funny, kind, caring person who wasn't looking for love. We also wanted an equally complex prince and discovered that he had been forced into finding a bride by his parents who are desperate to heal the kingdom. This led to a collision of two young people who just want to do their own thing.
PC: How did working with young people in a youth theatre context influence your versions of Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty?
MB: I was very fortunate to have young people do read-throughs early in the process. One of the exciting things about theatre is that I can write a line with an idea of the intent and the thought process behind it and how it will be delivered but then another person (it doesn't matter whether it is a young person or a professional actor) brings themselves to it and discovers something new. Sometimes that's what I imagined but other times it's completely different and that's incredibly exciting. Working with young people as a writer is lovely because they are gloriously honest and if they don't like something, they just tell you. I'm incredibly proud of both Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty because the young performers have embraced them and made them better than I could have ever hoped.
Twitter: @MattBeames