Mutual Inspiration of Artists: Dafydd's back story

 

 

Photo from The Tin Shed Experience

 

I'm back in the studio today and preparing for a visit from 5 members of the Swansea Ukulele Group who will be learning some of the songs from the production to perform live on the tour which starts in January 2013.

 

But somethings is playing on my mind ...

 

 

 

When professional actor Simon Morgan Thomas came to do the film shoot in St.David's he asked me for the back story of the character Dafydd.

 

He wanted to get inside the character's life .. and I immediately gave him a back story that I didn't know was in my head!

 

Simon kindly wrote to me after the shoot to say it he had found it 'an inspirational day' .. and yes, it was,  (mutually so thanks Simon) as he has inspired me to think about Dafydd the person in a much wider context ...

 

Dafydd is married to his childhood sweetheart, Bethan ... she is a comely rounded woman, wearing a floral knee length dress, her faded redded blonde hair is worn loosely up, with fine and curled whisps forever falling; her cheeks round and ruddy, her shoes worn and flat.

 

She smiles without frown and loves to bake. She wears  an apron, contrasting floral to her dress.

 

 

 

Her kitchen is like the one in the Dylan Thomas Birth house but with a big old pine table in the middle, that use to be her grandmother's.

 

They have a son ... possibly Ollie from the Tin Shed and Gwilli train shoot ... he loves the outdoors. They have chickens and a barn with a cow and Ollie milks Daisy for breakfast early in the mornings.

 

 

 

They can see the sea in the distance from their upstairs windows (or maybe they live in the little white cottage on the front of Llangrannog which is always boarded up with window shutters these days) and Ollie gazes from his bedroom at the waves, watching the boats dance, much in the way Dylan Thomas watched the boats from the hidden window in his bedroom ... (see earlier blog)

 

On the morning before Guinivere and the Mermaids bring the floods, Dafydd kisses Bethan goodbye on her cheek making her blush as she does regularly ... she is busy steeping dried fruit in cold tea ready for her Bara Brith ...

 

'Hwyl fawr BB Cariad.'

'Goodbye Sweetheart BB.'

 

Aside: Dafydd's knick name for her is  Bara Brith Bethan ... 'BB'

 

 

He walks, as he always does, to his little fishing boat to make his catch of the day, winding down the narrow pathway in the hills .. like the one at Morfa Isaf leading to the beach where we will film the dancers in October ...

 

 

His little boat is a large coracle painted over the bitumen, faded blue and dirty white and his nets were passed to him from his father who was also a fisherman in West Wales.

 

He is a quiet man who keeps himself to himself  but still everyone knows him and him them, such as it is in a village where you have lived all your life ...

 

So all this had formulated in my mind without me knowing or expressing it and now ...

 

Now I must decide whether or not this back story features in the production? Whether to hint at it or make it explicit as an introduction ...

 

I will reflect on this when I go on writing retreat next weekend and keep ya posted ...