Interview: Robert Softley Gale of Birds of Paradise Theatre talks disabled representation and snobbishness about musicals
02/03/2024
Birds of Paradise, Scotland's pre-eminent disabled-led theatre company, is celebrating its 30th anniversary with a tour of its darkly comic play Don't Make Tea.
Before the company hits the road later this month I spoke to artistic director Robert Softley Gale about how he chooses what work to produce, disabled representation in the theatre (and yes Richard III at The Globe comes up) and his favourite type of theatre to watch.
Here are the highlights from that chat, scroll down to watch the video.
Tell us a bit about the work you do as artistic director of the Birds of Paradise (BOP) theatre company and how you decide what work to produce.
The company has been going for 31 years, and I’ve been artistic director since 2012. And I think the role is best explained as putting disabled stories onto the stage.
And that sounds very simplistic and ‘what's the big deal with that’? But if you look at our culture, there's a real lack of disabled stories.
I feel like BOP has a role to play in putting those stories on stage.
The first show I produced was a sex comedy called Wendy Hoose in 2014. It was a very standard two-actor comedy where they meet online, get together, and then he comes to her apartment and discovers that she's got no legs.
So, he’s immediately having to navigate how that works.
Taking stories that are quite familiar, like a sex comedy, and then putting disability into them is something I think is very interesting.
The stories we have to tell aren't radically different, but with a different perspective, they've got something different to say.
Then there was Purposeless Movements, which was a physical theatre piece with four disabled guys telling you about their lives and explaining what masculinity meant to them as disabled men.
Then My Left/Right Foot, which is a musical co-produced with the National Theatre of Scotland.
That took the story of Christie Brown who wrote My Left Foot and asked the question: If an amateur theatre company tried to put this on stage, how wrong could they get it, how inappropriate could you be?
It's a very in-your-face musical. It was really well received as a big scale, quite shocking but also quite endearing musical about disability.
The key is that people came for a great night at the theatre; they didn't come to be told what it's like to be disabled because that's not very exciting.
So I guess I'm telling you about those productions to explain how I pick things. It's very much about what will attract audiences.
"If you come away from a piece of theatre having laughed very hard, having cried and thinking about something a different way, then its job done"
I hate theatre that's navel-gazing and 'what I want to say'. I mean, obviously, it's about what I want to say, but it's about what audiences want to hear, what they want to find out about.
It's about being aware of where the audience is, what they're interested in, what will entertain and surprise them and what will educate them. That's not a very popular word.
If you come away from a piece of theatre having laughed very hard, having cried and thinking about something a different way, then its job done.
Your next production is called Don’t Make Tea, what is the play about, and what can audiences expect?
Don't Make Tea came about because we wanted to make something that spoke to disabled people who maybe don't already go to the theatre. And an issue like the welfare state and disability benefits is very relevant to a lot of disabled people.
Nobody would argue that the welfare state isn't in a very bad place. But it's not just about money, there's something more than that.
Money would help massively, but it doesn't fix everything. I've got a question about how and why we support disabled people in society.
The welfare state is one method of doing that, but why support disabled people, let's really unpick that.
Rob Drummond wrote Don't Make Tea, and he came up with this idea for a procedural piece of theatre that looks at a benefit assessment.
"You're having to talk about yourself at your worst, and that's not what most people ever have to do."
Benefits assessments are horrendous; they are notoriously uncomfortable and invasive. You're having to talk about yourself at your worst, and that's not what most people ever have to do.
They're almost the opposite of a job interview, where you make things up about how great you are.
I suggested: What if we build in access to the production, so things like audio description, sign language interpretation and captions?
And Rob met that challenge beautifully.
Don't Make Tea is the story of a woman, Chris, whose impairment is getting worse gradually. She can't even work part-time and has to be assessed for disability benefits.
We're set about ten years into the future, and the government has come up with a great idea of getting everybody back into work because that will fix everything.
A benefits assessor comes along, but it all goes horribly wrong.
I can't explain how it goes wrong without giving it all away, but understand that things get quite violent and messy. And there's a lot of comedy in that as well.
Has disabled representation in theatre got any better in recent years? And what would make the biggest difference for disabled performers and creatives?
I started performing as a disabled actor around about 22 years ago. And undeniably things have got better in that time.
There are more opportunities for disabled people to become actors with more access to theatre schools and youth theatre. And there are slightly more disabled people on stage.
But things have got a long, long way to go. It's by no means great.
I think TV took a big step forward because Eastenders, Coronation Street, Emmerdale - the big soaps - started to have disabled actors as part of their ongoing cast.
There in your living room every night were disabled characters in everyday situations and that was a massive step forward for disabled actors on TV.
We haven't seen the same thing in theatre. There's still a lack of disabled actors who are just on stage because they're great actors who are playing, I don't know, Romeo or playing any other part.
"We are told over and over again that there aren’t any parts for disabled actors, and then when there are, they get played by non-disabled people."
It's very rare and still very noticeable when it does happen.
Casting disabled actors in theatre has to become unremarkable. It has to become something that is no big thing for the audience.
The only way you could do that is by casting disabled people more and more.
Hades Town in the West End has a woman with one arm cut off at the elbow. She is part of the ensemble, a great dancer and singer, and she's just doing her part and getting on with it.
So, things are beginning to go in the right direction, but they're not anywhere near there yet.
We also need to have more disabled people on stage playing overtly disabled parts as well. I reject this idea of an either-or.
Things like The Globe casting a non-disabled actor to play Richard III, it's quite a step backwards.
We are told over and over again that there aren’t any parts for disabled actors, and then when there are, they get played by non-disabled people.
I think you can understand why people are a little bit peeved about that.
You act and direct, if you had to choose between them, which would it be?
I think my gut flippant response is neither, they are both horrible and involve a lot of agony.
I love being on stage because I love connecting to the audience. I love that moment where you can look a member of the audience in the eye and see that there's a real connection.
That moment first happened to me about 22 years ago. I saw a woman cry as I was giving a monologue. To have that power over someone is incredible.
But I love directing because I can tell stories as a director that I couldn't tell as an actor, so it gives me flexibility.
If I had to choose, it would be acting.
What theatre do you like watching the most?
Well, I am a sucker for a musical, and it's quite an unpopular opinion. I think in the UK, we're quite snobby about the musical.
We're getting better; in the last five to 10 years, the UK musical has become a bigger and bigger thing.
I think the way a musical can convey a story and connect to the audience in a way that a straight play can't always do is quite something.
You'll always see me in the West End trying to see a musical over something more straight-laced.
Don't Make Tea tour details:
21–22 March Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh.
26 March – 6 April Soho Theatre, London.
9 April The Gaiety Theatre, Ayr.
11–13 April Tron Theatre, Glasgow.
16 April Cumbernauld Theatre, Cumbernauld.
19 April Ffwrnes Theatre, Llanelli
Visit the Bird of Paradise website for more details and to buy tickets.
Enjoyed this interview? Try these:
Theatre in 5 questions with director Sara Joyce includes chat about Sara's play Boy Parts, Soho Theatre.
Theatre in 5 questions with award-winning director Emily Aboud - includes chat about Emily's new play Flip! which is touring the UK
Theatre in 5 questions with writer-director Rebecca Holbourn who talks about her play Violated
You can find all my videos - interviews and reviews - on my YouTube channel