A DAY IN THE LIFE

by Jez Bond

In N4 all day, beginning with a meeting at Islington Community Theatre. Currently based in an office at The Pleasance, this young company, enthusiastically run by artistic director Ned Glasier, has quickly grown in scale over the past eighteen months. We shared plans with each other and discussed possible ways to link up over the coming years.

On site I met with an established actor who had heard about our project through the cyber grapevine. After a short tour of the building we sat and discussed the theatre, our passions, our disappointments and hopes – all over a burger round the corner. Based on our meeting today (and having seen him in shows in the past) I do hope we will work together at The Park.

Later in the afternoon we met with the property consultant for John Jones and discussed mutual planning and build schedules. The actual John Jones build will run to a similar timeframe as ours but the student housing being created on the site may be 12 months behind. It was encouraging to hear the consultant talk so positively about the changes in the area and about the City North site being a major catalyst in the regeneration by giving the town a centre.

Jordan, our project manager, sat opposite me while I finished off some paperwork and completed reading a play that I would love to direct in the building (desperately trying to find time to do some artistic things). Occasionally he fired questions at me and we stopped to discuss the dilemmas which have been plaguing us for the past few weeks.

In the midst of all this, the planners have come back requesting three more documents before our application can be validated. To put this in perspective, the pile of documents we submitted last week was six inches thick.

Lovely dinner with some actor friends this eve…