Click on the links below for the Synopsis of the following plays

Paul of Tarsus (See Below )

Grace Under Pressure .

TimeOut Review 2000

"A subversive, darkly humorous and at times unsettling play which captures the fear anger and hurt of a young person's fight with a terminal illness and the reactions of friends who find the reality of death hard to face and whose behaviour is at times found wanting. Cancer creeps up sideways, It attacks from the inside. It takes the breath away. A bit like Richard Morris' new play. The sharp and spiky writing packs an emotional punch strong enough to wind you....It's hard perhaps to see why on a summer's evening you should want to see a play about cancer and death that uses the music of Leonard Cohen-but Grace Under Pressure is engaging and weirdly life affirming".

Palmy Balmy Days

Oldham Coliseum Script Report

I enjoyed reading this play. I't's a quite strange but also a funny , moving and extremely interestng piece, and it reminded me a bit of Jim Cartwright's play Bed

Mr Morris has deliberately decided to make a play without much plot, as he says his characters have"lost the plot". But he builds character wih great subtlety, through the drip drip of relevant information-and as each character tells the story of their life, the others present take bit parts in those stories. We don't linger too long on any individual story, but instead cut back and forth between tales, thus our attention remains held for the duration of the piece.

The playwright uses the audience very well too-and from the witty opening speech we know we're in safe hands-we feel certain we will be entertained , and we're not disappointed.

It's also nice to read a play containing such well drawn and vividly imagined older characters, which offers cracking rolls for older characters.

There is a good use of music and song and amongst so much fine comic writing I especially liked the running gag about Eastbourne

Unfortunately, I don't think it's really an Oldham Coliseum main house play, but it was a pleasure to read such a poignant, imaginative, well constructed piece.

Short Story

Guidance

A short story published by Scriptor, A Green Arrow Publication

The lobby of the hotel smelt of old bacon and stale beer. A burbling radio crackled with Chris Tarrant inanities and the receptionist yawned. The imitation leather of the armchair sucked at Billy's back. He gazed at a print of a dog behind slimy glass. He looked at his voucher: Panoramic Tour of London. Christian Brothers School, Dublin. 30 pax I teacher.

A weekend in Dublin. A cold rainsoaking morning, the pub glass steamy and wet. He watched the door, a whisky warming his guts. Blathna came in like a hovering angel, a panorama of big lips, shining eyes and life giving laughter. Shaking the drops from her hair she looked at him and the pub stopped its hum and looked at her. He had begged her to come to London when she finished her studies at the University. Why go back to Belfast and all those distorted minds? No-one will know what religion we are there or care.

The priest approached, a tall meagre man with dirty grey hair and unkempt nostrils. He was smoking. Billy coughed as he peeled his back from the chair, making a sucking sound. "Are you our guide for a panoramic tour of London?"

That's me....Billy Drummond" They shook hands. "Are you from Belfast Billy?" "A long time ago....I'll go and find the coach driver"

Jim was sitting at the wheel smoking. As always he was immaculate in his blazer with his former regiment's badge on the pocket and beautifully pressed trousers, his hair brylcreamed back from his forehead. The priest led the boys onto the coach. "Now this is our guide for the next two hours so listen and learn something about this great city" Billy picked up the microphone and went into his routine.

"On your right the Houses of Parliament, on your left Downing Street. A statue of Sir Walter Raleigh. He was a former mayor of Youghal in County Cork. The men guarding Buckingham Palace are the Irish Guards" " Do you have to be Irish to be in the Guards "asked a boy. " No...nor Catholic or Protestant" The reply was too sharp. The boy looked at him with venomous eyes

You didn't know Blathna" Billy thought. I asked her to marry me in Green Park. She had laughed softly. " And what are our prospects young man? Me a Fenian and you an Orangeman". She had taken his arm and they walked towards the sound of the band. He turned her towards him, overwhelmed by love and kissed her. She was embarassed in the public arena and blood flushed her cheeks. "Will you marry me Blathna ?" " Of course I will but first I want an ice cream....go King Billy with your musket fife and drum and do not return without bearing gifts of Chocolate and Vanilla" .........He had to go outside the park to find a vendor and watched as he scooped out the icecream and stuck it into cones. He walked carefully back towards the music, a cone in each hand. Was that thunder? His hands were bleeding....pieces of glass sticking out of the red flesh. His ears were blocked. He walked in a trance towards the bandstand. It had gone. A trumpet lay in front of him. Next to it was a leg with a boot on its foot. Blathna got angry with bigots. In her commonwealth of love a sparrow coudn't fall without her hearing the beating of its wings.

The coach windows were dirty. The microphone was hot and sticky. "An IRA bomb killed several people here..." The boys clapped and cheered. Jim's neck went red and he stopped the coach. "That's it Billy...I was in Northern Ireland...." Billy stared at the priest. The priest said "Wait" and took the microphone. He stared down the coach and his face lookd grey, his eyes moist. " My sister was a nun. I was having a cup of tea with her in Belfast before flying back to Dublin. I stepped outside to get some cigarettes. They told me later that it wasn't one of the bigger bombs.....I found her" His voice faltered. " Lying in her own blood....this gentle woman" The boys were still, shocked, terrified to move. " She died in my arms, wordless. Her eyes beseeching me. Why?....She didn't die for her religion. She died because she was having a cup of tea with her brother. There isn't a day of my life that I don't think about her and the hatred that cut her down. I harangue God "Stop this carnage!" Perhaps he can't. Perhaps he's like me....old... tired...disillusioned. Maybe he should step aside for a younger man. Mary was my sister and my friend......Do you still want to applaud?" The priest sobbed and sat down. Billy put his arms around him and rocked him like a child. The coach driver sat at the wheel, buried his face in his hands for a moment and then started the engine.

Copyright Richard Morris 2002

Stately Homeless first published by writernet 2002 copywright Richard Morris.

I've done various volunteering work over the years but none of it prepared me for the Homeless Centres run by St Mungo's. Spread out through London in a variety of buildings, staffed by people trying to staunch the wounds inflicted upon the lost tribes of the world, they open their doors to the homeless, intrepid squatters, travellers, asylum seekers and loners. People with mental and psychological scars trawl in and out of church crypts,old buildings and scruffty squats, their worldly goods in battered bags searching for....what?

Food? Food is not a problem. Benjys leave out unsold sandwiches, Londoners and tourists throw away half eaten packets of food, leave plates half full on cafe tables. Breakfast can be bought for eighty pence in most centres. The Sister's of Mercy provide free lunches.

Clothes ? nearly every centre has a clothing store. Take your choice from the discarded clothes of the rich.

Money? The experienced street person knows how to work the social security system. "Tunnelling" in the underpasses or "bridging" Waterloo and Hungerford with downcast mien and a sad little dog wagging its tail can produce amazing results on a good day. Finance becomes a little more difficult if you drink a lot or like a spliff with your can and sandwich; becomes even more difficult if you are clucking for a bit off the spoon. Some of the youngrer boys and girls end up selling sex for drugs "Can you spare any change please?".

For St Mungos' I offered to run any sessions involving the spoken or written word and in doing so entered into the lives of the "walking wounded"

Kat went to Oxford, George was a bank manager, Bill a Sainsbury's butcher. Mary has done every drug possible, has been clean for five years but can't keep appointments. Ted speaks three languages but is incoherent in English. Dennis is a brilliant poet but wants to argue with everyone so gets thrown out by the staff at The Centre and beaten up on the streets. Jed wrote a play for Radio Four and was a founder member of CardBoard Citizens. A very funny Geordie, he sings writes and dances. Now he's in silent mode, back on the gear and won't speak to me.

The Cedars

After a training course at St Mungo's headquarters in Shepherds Bush, I started at The Cedars, a huge Victorian house in Clapham with about one hundred and twenty beds in cell like rooms. I arrived in the middle of a mini riot. The young woman behind the barred counter was unfazed. "Sign in". I signed the register as simply Richard....no last names is the rule. "Wander around and introduce yourself to the clients" she said, as a man and woman wrestled each other to the ground. Interesting use of the word client I thought. Gives people a status, an identity. Also gives the charity status. Homelessness is big business. St Mungo's employs over one hundred and fifty staff and has no shortage of volunteers. I wandered off tentatively as two members of staff sorted out Romeo and Juliet still writhing on the floor. Men stood smoking at open windows on a freezing day or sat staring at the television screen in the recreation room. " Hello I'm Richard ...I'm going to run a writing class in ten minutes time" A man with long lanky hair finally focused on me. "Where you from Richard ..... " Wandsworth" I said " Oh yeah I was in there once.....got some right kickings" I stored the line away in my little notebook mind like a squirrel.

St Pancras

The Cedars didn't really work for me. Tired staff were bombarded by aggressive clients and forgot to tell anybody I was coming. I tried discussion groups, a news letter, teaching English to a Frenchman and Italian before accepting a new assignment A Reminiscence class for Alchoholics in St Pancras. It's a contradiction really isn't it? you drink to forget in St Pancras.

The rules are that you can drink in the privacy of your room or the recreation room as much as you like as long as you don't become abusive. The staff wear panic bleepers in case of attack. I decided not to because I felt they woudn't trust me if I did. Two brothers from Hayes and Andrew from Glasgow sat in dirty armchairs gobbing into a central spittoon and waving their cans at me. Their faces were bloody and disfigured. Andrew told me they had just come from the park where they'd had a lot of fun. "You see we nut each other in the face until one gives up and has to buy the drinks".

I started to make notes on my day at the Centre. The men started to trust me and I came to admire their resilience and humour in what were to me desperate surroundings. I had quickly given up the idea of trying to impose any structure on the sessions. At one meeting we had an informed discussion about the differences between drug taking and drinking.

Lambeth

After twelve weeks of St Pancras the course finished and I went off to the North Lambeth Day Centre, situated in the crypt of St John's Church Waterloo. Gemma, a dresser at The National Theatre and a published poet was running a creative writing group and some of her clients wanted to write a play. I put into practice some improvising and writing techniques I had absorbed at courses with Complicite and City Lit. I was able to say... Just....that I was a playwright as my play Grace Under Pressure was going to be performed that summer.

The hardest part of working in these environments is the different agendas one must learn to accomodate

"Are you from the Social?"

A fucking writer .....piss off"

" Are you a spy?"

Suspicion and jealousies, confrontations, people coming off drugs or going on them, aggression and failure to turn up for a session are all part of the game. Yet despite all this, we had some fantastic sessions with clients revealing great talents as actors and writers. Participants acted out suggested scenes then I wrote down their general outlines and ideas, or took their written stuff home and put it into play form. The following week we acted out the piece even if the writer didn't turn up. Most of the group loved the improvising. At one session I remained silent for an hour whilst three people enlightened me on the various ways of smoking cocaine. Mary then proceeded to a tour de force acting explosion depicting a desperate addict's search for a hit.

Stately Homeless....Article originally published by writernet copywright 2002