3.    What are the mechanics of how comedic lines and moments are constructed? 

Hmm, difficult to put this into words. I’ve been doing this for so long, I just go with my instincts of what’s funny and what isn’t. I think at the core of it, it’s observing a particular situation and looking at the most absurd and ridiculous version of that situation or indeed it might be a person. You also have to figure out the rhythm and timing of a joke once you’ve written the material and punchline because poor delivery of a potentially funny gag can make it seem painfully unfunny. 

4.    How did you hone your craft as an actor? What have you learned since your first performances on stage or film through to the present? What was your favorite role to play?                                                                                                                                                                 

It’s about inhabiting another person based on how that person is written in the script. A good script really does flesh out a character on the page, and as I’m learning my lines I begin to form a strong picture of who that person is and why they’ve made the choices they’ve made in the story. I think it helps to have a strong sense of empathy and understanding of human nature, and as I’ve got older and had more life experiences, it’s helped give me a broader range of understanding various types of people.

5.    You have performed in more than 40 stage productions and over a dozen film/TV productions. Tell us about your favorite stage production and your favorite film/TV production.                                                                                 

In terms of stage productions, there have been a quite few I really liked so I’ll try and narrow it down. I’ve played the character Hoke in Driving Miss Daisy on 3 separate occasions and it’s a meaty part and the character himself is very likeable as well, and a lot smarter than he may appear to be at first glance. Another one was Friar Lawrence in a recent production of Romeo and Juliet. To date it’s the largest Shakespearean part I’ve played, and I was pleased to get my head properly around the language and make sense of it. I will also mention a musical called The Big Life. I initially had a small-ish part in that but ended up having to cover some of the bigger roles due to other actors coming down with various illnesses during its run in the West End. To date, it’s the only Black British musical to make it to London’s West End, which is the equivalent of New York’s Broadway. The musical told of the travails of the Windrush generation i.e. my parents' generation who were invited to help rebuild Britain after the damage it suffered during WWII, but they were met with the most appalling racism when they got here.                                                                                                    In terms of film/TV roles, I haven’t really had big roles as such. During lockdown, however, I did this online production which was kind of part theatre/part film in its presentation. In it I got to play an aging astronaut--80 something, so I needed a ton of ageing up make-up. It was basically a semi-fictional account of the Apollo 13 space mission, and a played the older version of one of the astronauts on that mission. The action flitted back and forth between me and another actor playing older versions of these astronauts telling of our experience in retrospect, and other actors playing out the actual space mission.                                                  

7.    You performed in the film “Wicked”. Please tell us about that experience.                                    

It was what is known in the business as a “straight offer” i.e. unlike many I didn’t have to audition for it. A member of the choreography had seen many months earlier auditioning for something else entirely different and remembered me from that so when she was asked to suggest names for the crowd/chorus scenes, she put my name forward. I thought I was only going to have to do a bit of singing, but I ended up learning a pretty difficult dance routine, and dance is not my forte, so it was especially challenging. It was about 4 or 5 weeks of seriously hard work, incredibly long hours, and physically exhausting. I’ve had regular jobs where I’ve worked in warehouses loading heavy boxes on to trucks on the night shift, but this was harder! However, when I look back at the final product, I feel it was totally worth it.  

8.    How do you feel when you see your writing come to life on stage or screen?                             

I feel an immense sense of pride, especially if it really seems to work. It also feels really good being able to create work for other actors.

9.    You have been writing Christmas plays for the Theatre Peckham in South London for the past 5 years. Please tell us about your creative process for this project. When do you start? How do you ideate? How long does it take you to complete?    

I started on the first one during lockdown back in 2020. I hadn’t written anything for quite some time before then but as I had time on my hands because of the Covid quarantine, I really dived into it. The basis of all these particular shows is we use a well-known fairy tale or iconic story and give it a modern adaptation. Also, because we are catering to the local community in Peckham, the adaptations usually start off in Peckham before the central characters get transported somewhere else (or not depending on the tale). Also, the cast is made up of a handful of adult professional actors and loads of young people—age range between 9 and 16 usually. These young people attend performing arts classes at this same theatre and quite a few of them have ambitions to go on and do stuff professionally whether it’s dance, music, acting etc. There will usually be around 30 of these kids altogether—2 teams of 15. And each team will alternate the shows during the run, as they themselves are not paid professionals. So, one of the things I have to do as the writer for these shows is infuse them with themes, language and other motifs that young people can relate. That usually means at some point when I’m writing these, I have to learn how teenagers and tweens talk, which for a 60-something man can be its own challenge but it is fun and fascinating learning how these young people relate to each other and the rest of the world. Regarding the ideas. Sometimes the artistic director of the theatre, Suzann McLean, herself a Black actor and director of many years, may suggest an idea to me. This was the case with very first one I wrote. She said that when she spoke to the youngsters about what they’d like to see or perform, they said “Wizard Of Oz meets Black Panther”.  As an avid Marvel Comics enthusiast from childhood, I didn’t need much convincing. So, the story started out in Peckham near Christmas time rather than Kansas; the heroine was a teenage girl of African and Caribbean heritage, who was supposed to be helping out in her Grandma’s takeaway restaurant but got swept off by a winter storm to Ozanda—an amalgamation of Oz and Wakanda—where as well as being a magical place, it was Afro-futuristic with technological advances not yet seen in the outside world. To get back to Peckham, she had to find a man known only as The Wonderful, and was helped on her journey by a talking mannequin (replacing the scarecrow from the original story), a cyborg/AI type (replacing the tin man), and a lion with a difference in that this cowardly lion had fashioned himself as a London street gang member who’s theme tune was a grime rap (the school audiences who came to see it, especially loved that tune!), The twist with the lion is that unbeknown to his “crew”, he was secretly a vegan, and he would also let slip that he was well-read.  The second show I wrote was my idea. I went with an adaptation of the Charles Dickens character, A Christmas Carol, and we called it Scroogelicious. The main character, Ebony Scrooge was a 30/40 something self-made Black millionaire property developer/slum landlord who had originally grown up impoverished on rough council estate in Peckham but had got a scholarship to an exclusive high school, kind of like a boarding school. From there he’s gone on to university, worked as a lawyer in a firm that specialized in legal aid type cases, helping people on low income. However, he’s been head hunted by an unscrupulous property developer who’d mentored him and corrupted him so when we first meet him, he is money obsessed mean anti-Christmas, capitalist pig dog hell bent on completely gentrifying Peckham and pricing all the low income people out of the area. The gentrification aspect really struck a chord with audiences because that’s happening all over London right now, particularly in parts that used to be seen as low-income/ impoverished areas. In terms of how much time I have to write these shows, it’s usually a couple of months for a first draft, then a couple more months for a second draft. On occasion a third might be needed but I can usually get it done in two. And it has to be ready for rehearsal by the start of the school year as the youngsters start rehearsing twice weekly from then. The adults don’t get brought in til mid November for 2 weeks of rehearsal. Lastly, all these shows have music. So, as well as writing the script, I also write the lyrics for the songs (which is its own specialist task), and a young man called Jordan Xavier writes the music for the songs.

10.    As an artist, what do you hope to impart to people? What impact do you want to make?                                                                                                                                              

My first priority is to entertain people; give them a good laugh and a bit of good cheer. Lord knows we all need that right now. For the young people who come to watch these shows, it’s a great way to get them interested in the theatre and the arts in general, particularly if you can find a way to make the stories relevant to them and their lives. But I also want the adults who bring these kids to the shows to be as entertained as the young people are so it’s about striking that balance that lands with both sets of audience. Also, because we are partly aiming these at young people, both Suzann and I are very keen on imparting some sort of message/ morality tale within the story.

11.    What advice would you give to aspiring actors and writers?                                                          

It’s not just about your talent. You have to be prepared to work damn hard in this business, and. If you really want to succeed, be very persistent and don’t give up. You may find your resolve severely tested at times—only a tiny percentage of actors are in regular work doing the actual job of acting, and for many, it’s not worth it, which is understandable. We all have to make a living somehow. But if you really want this, hang in there. And really work at being the best you can possibly be at it too. Never assume that you’ve gotten to a place where you have nothing new to learn because you’ll end up stagnating and growing as an artist. There is ALWAYS something new you can learn.

12.    What would you like to do as an actor or writer that you have not done yet?