Today I take pleasure in announcing that Jennifer Mullen has joined the Beauty & Beast Toy Theatre team, and that we are working together to create a filmed performance of Olivia McCannon's wonderful play-script with Jennifer giving life to all the roles, accompanied by the toy theatre in action. In a curtain-raiser to all that excitement, Jennifer and I have been in conversation.

Clive: Jennifer, for the past nine months the artwork, model construction, script and graphic design for the Beauty & Beast Toy Theatre have been gently evolving into the product we have today. You've come to the project only recently, but from our conversations I'm getting the distinct impression you've hit the ground running, and that in part must be to do with the script by Olivia McCannon. What were your feelings when you read it?

Jennifer: Right from the beginning, I suspected that Olivia McCannon and I might be close together in age. So many of what at first glance might seem to be 'throwaway' lines resonate so deeply with me.
For example, Beauty herself, so often portrayed as the noble ingenue, in Olivia's hands becomes a somewhat exasperated, fully formed young woman cognisant of the ridiculousness of her situation. Her brusque declaration that 'we know why I'm here, let's not waste time getting up to speed' attitude, combined with the innocence, intricacy and beauty of the poetry itself delighted me.
Yet Beauty remains recognisably the same character we have all come across as children for 300 years. Thanks to Olivia's writing, I feel free to explore the character of Beauty, all of her anger as well as her inherent goodness, without worrying that she will be unrecognisable to anyone.
From a technical point of view, in terms of the actual playscript; it is subtle and wicked, the work of a poet at the very top of her game, and I feel a keen sense of responsibility to do the rhythm of the work justice.

Clive: My friend Simon Callow, who has a fair number of one-man shows under his belt, once told me that the thing he missed most when performing alone, was the camaraderie of the team and the liveliness of a rehearsal room filled with people and ideas. How do you feel about the fact that you'll be performing all of the roles in this short play?

Jennifer: I will be performing all the roles in the play. So I will play! As a child, I didn't have any problems holding a doll in each hand and improvising full blown dramatic confrontations that would put a soap opera to shame. It's been a while, I grant you, but if a toy theatre can't help me back into the unselfconscious headspace of a child with a couple of Barbies, I think I may be in the wrong profession!
Joking aside, I am happy to say that I don't consider this to be a 'one-woman show' at all. I'll have the beautiful characters written by Olivia, drawn by you, and brought to stunning animated life by David W. Slack right alongside me.
When we first spoke on the telephone about this project, you told me that in a previous collaboration with Simon Armitage of Hansel & Gretel, what had impressed you most in a live reading of the piece by him was that he didn't attempt to 'do' voices for each role, but simply read the lines in his own voice and let the characters speak for themselves. I found that really interesting.

Clive: The pandemic has changed the conditions of work for all of us. But because I live in a far- flung corner of west Wales, long before social distancing catapulted just about everyone into working through the mediums of email, messaging and 'Zoom', I'd been forging collaborative relationships via social media. My close collaboration with Dan Bugg of the Penfold Press has for the past five years been carried out almost entirely through Facebook and Insta messaging, and although David W. Slack and I have been in extensive daily contact as he designed the Beauty & Beast Toy Theatre model, we've never met. (A fact I find hard to believe because we feel very close.) The entertainment industry has been hard hit by Covid, and particularly live theatre which effectively closed down completely. How have things been for you as an actor? Have unexpected ways of working - and unexpected projects - emerged out of all this strangeness?

Jennifer: Can I tell you something? As an actor, the most unexpected thing for me was how I came to view NOT working.
When we think of actors, we naturally think of household names. But only 2% of professional actors make a living from the profession and 90% are out of work at any one time! So when the pandemic hit, I suddenly didn't have to go through the exhausting ritual actors face every time we meet casual acquaintances or family: answering the question "So what are you acting in now?" with a self deprecating shrug and a "well...."
It was such a relief.
Of course I got fed up of sitting on the balcony reading comics within about 2 weeks, so I and my fellow actor friends soon found each other online and began planning for the moment lockdown ended! I wrote my first script, participated in Zoom script readings for friends and rediscovered a desire to get out there and just DO something that had been waning in the couple of years prior to 2020.
Though restrictions are now easing, I've had to come to terms with the fact that the future of film and tv castings is going to be 'self-taped' auditions, which may sound convenient but instead of getting to meet and connect with a casting director, getting a feel for the room and trying a scene out a few times with feedback, I now have to film myself in a bathroom and hope for the best, which can sometimes be a frustrating experience!
But on the whole? I was so happy when productions were allowed to start up again. Remote work can be valuable and productive, but as an actor, NOTHING beats human contact when it comes to creating.
What about you? As an artist, do you think that you would still live in 'far-flung West Wales' if you didn't have the internet or would you need to live closer to an artistic hub?

Clive: Moving to Ty Isaf fifteen years ago coincided with the burgeoning of the Internet and the appearance of social media. Facebook was just taking off. Almost from the first week here our connections with the outside world began to grow. Of course the world managed to function perfectly well pre-Internet, but my re-location to a far-flung corner of Wales has been founded from the start on good, strong connections with my collaborators through social media messaging services, e-mails and much later, Zoom. How would I manage without these connections? I suspect not at all well. I love peace and quiet and even isolation in bite-size chunks. But I am collaborative by nature and I'm social by habit, so I need a balance. Before Covid Ty Isaf had been a bit of a creative hub, with my collaborators frequently spending time here so as to be able to work in close contact. We've held early brain-storming production meetings on performative works here, and I have a pretty good pop-up animation studio that I can fit into the dining-room when occasion demands.

Although you and I met just the once, several years ago in Cardiff at the home of a mutual friend, you've come to this project via a post you made at Facebook (social media, again) that caught my eye and got me thinking.

Jennifer: You have generously omitted the fact that my bad day was caused by my absolutely bombing in an audition that morning! I took to Facebook to admit as such and received a surprisingly sympathetic response. We actors rarely admit our failures because like sharks, theatre folk can smell blood in the water.

Clive: It must have been a slightly strange experience having someone coming at you out of the blue with a hard-to-describe and evolving project after you'd admitted on social media to having had a bad day.

Jennifer: If you were reading a novel, and the protagonist, dejected after yet another failed audition, received a message from a famous artist telling her that he'd like to offer her a chance at a challenging project because her honesty impressed him and she replied "Eh....nah", how far across the room do you think you would throw the book?

Clive: I take your point. Nevertheless, you took a leap of faith and engaged with me where many would have balked, and I appreciate that.

Jennifer: Gosh that's interesting that you would say that. Who would balk? Should I have balked? In all seriousness, you not only took a chance on me, you've shown nothing but faith in me from the start of this journey. I'm not taking that for granted.

Clive: Are you generally a cautious or adventurous person?

Jennifer: Yes, sometimes cautious and sometimes adventurous.

Clive: David W. Slack and I have a passion for the work of David Firmin and Oliver Postgate, who were the creators at Smallfilms of Clangers, Noggin the Nog and Bagpuss. When I described to you that Bagpuss was an inspiration for the low-tech way in which we hoped to make the film, you yelled with delight and enthusiasm. Did that cinch the deal for you?

Jennifer: I was already enthusiastic at the thought of a toy theatre, but the old stop motion beauty of Bagpuss is timeless and perfect and wonderful. It's so very British - comforting and sometimes uncomfortable at the same time.
I can't wait to see what we come up with together. I'm excited and nervous, comfortable and pushed beyond my comfort zone - I'm ready to be Bagpussed!

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Clive Hicks-Jenkins and Jennifer Mullen were in conversation. The top image is by David W. Slack, with special thanks to Ross Boyask for Jennifer Mullen's portrait shot.

The Design for Today Beauty & Beast Toy Theatre is available:

HERE

Artwork by Clive Hicks-Jenkins, Model Design by David W. Slack, Script by Olivia McCannon and Music for the play by Paul Sarin. Graphic Design by Laurence Beck the playbook.

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