North East writer Alison Carr wins prestigious Peter Shaffer Commission for new play about the end of things
Writer Alison Carr
Unfolding Theatre to develop That Friday Feeling (but Friday is the Apocalypse) – a darkly funny new play about closures, endings and what we leave behind
North East writer Alison Carr has been awarded a prestigious Peter Shaffer Commission to develop a major new play with Newcastle-based touring company Unfolding Theatre.
The £7,294 award, administered by the National Theatre in collaboration with the Sir Peter Shaffer Charitable Foundation, will support the development of That Friday Feeling (but Friday is the Apocalypse) – a funny, heartbreaking and unexpectedly playful story about what happens when everything starts to close.
Set in the offices of the London Gazette in the near future, the play follows the clerks responsible for recording endings as they become busier than ever. Company closures pour in alongside disappearing species, drying lakes and vanishing coral reefs. As the systems around them begin to fail, the office workers carry on with the everyday business of documenting what is coming to an end.
The play began with a conversation about the closure of a small brewing business and has grown into a story about the many ways things end: businesses, jobs, places, relationships, ecosystems and eventually the systems we depend upon.
For Carr and Unfolding Theatre, the commission is an opportunity to explore the biggest questions about endings and legacy through the smallest details of ordinary life – from the office kitchen to the final piece of paperwork.
Alison Carr said:
“I'm fascinated by closures because they’re everywhere, but we don’t always talk about what happens afterwards. A business closes, a shop disappears, a job ends, a species goes extinct – and somehow life carries on. I wanted to explore that huge idea through the very ordinary world of office workers doing their jobs. It’s a story about endings, but I hope it’s also funny, warm and full of life.”
Unfolding Theatre Artistic Director Annie Rigby said:
“Alison has an incredible ability to take enormous ideas and make them feel funny and human. With this new work, we're interested in closure in all its forms – and what we do when the things we thought were permanent turn out not to be.”
“This is a brilliant opportunity to champion one of the North East’s most exciting writers on a national platform. We’re delighted to be developing this work with Alison and to see where this extraordinary idea can take us.”
The play was first sparked by a conversation between Unfolding Theatre and actor and former brewer Carl Kennedy about the experience of closing a business. A subsequent research and development week brought together Carr, Rigby, designer Imogen Cloët, actors Carl Kennedy and Karen Traynor, and sound designer and performer David Brewis of Field Music.
Left to right - David Brewis, Cal Kennedy, Annie Rigby and Alison Carr
It was during this development that the team discovered that company closures are formally recorded in the London Gazette - a detail which became the starting point for Carr's imagined office at the end of the world.
That Friday Feeling (but Friday is the Apocalypse) explores endings, legacy, climate change and what remains when the systems we rely on begin to fail. Rather than approaching climate crisis through catastrophe alone, the play looks for humour and humanity in the smallest details of everyday life.
Unfolding Theatre plans to develop and premiere the play in the North East before seeking opportunities to tour nationally.
The Peter Shaffer Commission supports playwrights developing larger-scale original plays with three or more characters. Seven commissions are awarded each year, with five available through an open call delivered in partnership with regional theatres and companies across the UK.
For further information, email Director of Partnerships and Audiences, Victoria Sanderson.