DarrenBarefoot.com

I’m writing a play. It’s called Bolloxed and will–knock on wood, spin three times and throw the salt over your shoulder–premiere at the 2006 Victoria Fringe Festival , to be followed by a run at the Vancouver Fringe Festival. The folks at Theatre Tart will produce the show.
There is, of course, a weblog about writing and producing the play. It’s at www.thisplayisbolloxed.com. Here’s my spiel about it:

Jack is a Canadian software engineer living in Dublin, Ireland. One day, while jogging around Merrion Square, two odd things happen simultaneously–he feels a sharp pain in his testicles, and he spots Aoife (pronounced ‘ee-fah’) talking to a very peculiar person. Aoife’s Irish, and works near Merrion Square.

The play tells two stories. One is concerned with how Jack and Aoife meet and what happens afterwards. The other is about Jack’s balls, and what’s wrong with them.

And yes, this project makes me quite nervous:

I’m afraid my play won’t be funny or entertaining or insightful orcompelling or touching or any of the things that good plays are. I’malso afraid (don’t tell Theatre Tart) that it won’t get done, at leastnot to anywhere near my satisfaction.

Non-fiction writinghas always come naturally to me. Good or bad, it flows out of me likeyesterday’s taco. Writing drama, however, is hard work. I struggle withpretty much every sentence. I’m not trying to sound heroic–I’m justexplaining why I sound cowardly.

The Victoria Fringe is (I believe) in late August, followed immediately by the Vancouver Fringe. I’ll post important announcements here, but most of the action will be over at the play blog.

I’m lobbying the producers to get me some free tickets for local bloggers to come see the show. More on that as it materializes. In the meantime, if you’re inclined to send some linkage my way, I wouldn’t turn it down.