Despite still being in high school yourself, you’re an old hand at the festival, having won both the high school contest and our one act contest yourself previously. What’s it like now being in the director’s seat for the school contest plays? How has your previous experience with NotaBle Acts informed your work? 

Directing for the first time has been an exciting and daunting process. The past few weeks have taught me so much and forced me to adapt in all sorts of new and interesting ways. Working with student playwrights has been such a gift. It’s a wonderful sense of deja vu, seeing someone whose shoes you were in just a couple of years ago. One thing that’s great about NotaBle is that it forms connections between artists of different experience levels. Most of what I’ve learnt comes from the theatre artists I’ve worked with in the past. I’ve always been interested in directing, but never thought that I’d do it while still in high school. Part of what gave me the confidence to apply is knowing that I have experience working with a wide variety of artists. Watching the work of people who know more than you is, in my mind, the best way to learn. I’m incredibly grateful to have been mentored by patient and understanding artists throughout my years at NotaBle and beyond. 

You’re directing both Olivia’s play and our Middle School contest winner, Burden of Proof. Tell us a bit about that play, and how you’ve approached directing it (as well as perhaps the contrast between it and Olivia’s, since they are quite different in terms of style). 

Burden of Proof is a timeless scenario; an interrogation between detective and suspect. James Stevenson, one of the playwrights, described it to me as a contained thriller. The nice thing about readings is that all the rehearsal time can be spent on the text. There isn’t the pressure to learn lines or blocking. I’ve been lucky to work with two extremely different but stylized plays that give myself and the actors so many fascinating threads to untangle. For Little Rock, we’ve had conversations about childhood trauma, historical queerness and PTSD. Whereas Burden of Proof has prompted us to dig through the script line by line and pull apart the tactics of each character. Each play presents its own challenges and I’ve been lucky to work with actors who are enthusiastic and willing to throw themselves into new work. 

This is the first time you’ve submitted a play to NotaBle Acts, and it ended up one of the winners of our One Act contest. How does that feel, and what was your reaction when you found out you won? 

When I’d heard my play had won, it didn’t feel real and it still doesn’t! To have something I created turned into something physical by a group of awesome people is such an honour!  

Tell us a bit about Predormital—where the play came from and how it evolved. You’re a writer in other genres as well—does it fit in with other writing you’ve done, or is it something very different? 

Predormital is very different from my usual writing. I wrote it during a very hard time in my life, when I wanted to make sure I learned something from what happened. And so I wrote a play about the lessons I’d learned in hopes that it would help me to hold onto them.  

There are some sci-fi elements to the show, would you agree? Any particular inspirations for that element of the show? 

The show does have some science fiction elements to it, ones that could very well be explored further. When I was having difficulty coming to terms with what had happened, I kept thinking “what would I give to go back, try doing things differently. Just to see how they could have turned out.” That’s when ideas began connecting to other ideas in my head until I had something I felt I had to put on paper.  

What’s the dramaturgy and rehearsal process been like for the play? How has it evolved over the last few months? 

The process for bringing this play to fruition was challenging, being my first proper experience with playwriting and dramaturgy, and involved a lot of all-nighters and rumination. But it was all worth it to see the final product, which everyone else involved worked just as hard to achieve as I did, seeing potential in my work that I wished I’d thought of myself.  

 What do you hope the audience takes away from Predormital? 

I hope people leave the show less afraid to have that difficult conversation with someone they care about. To be more honest with their loved ones and not take them for granted. And most importantly, I hope any viewers who have regrets and grudges leave being able to forgive themselves and those who wronged them, and are able to look back at those memories and smile, knowing they’ve grown.