Artist’s Corner: Leo Mercer - Blogpost 5

Follow Leo Mercer's journey into the 50 Jewish Objects, through his own words.

Creating SCROLL

Funnily enough, while I did my undergraduate in theology/philosophy at Manchester University between 2010-2013, theatre wasn't on my radar at all. I tried to grab every opportunity do extra modules in creative writing, but my interest was poetry. Since then, theatre has become my life, as a professional theatremaker, writer and producer with my music theatre company leo&hyde. One of my favourite things about it is just how people-y it is: every step is a collaboration.

When I was asked to create Scroll, I was excited about how I could bring the mentality of a theatremaker into the creative process of poetry. The result, which you can see here, is as much the input of the actors, animator and sound designer as it is my letters:

The voice actors are:

• Rebecca McAuley, who played Amanda in The Marriage of Kim K, a pop adaptation of Mozart's The Marriage of Figaro and which, like Scroll, tries to update a canonical text;

• Ben Raymond, who played the eponymous Guy in GUY which, like Scroll, has a deeply digital aesthetic. It was itself actually performed to a sold-out audience in Manchester University's Martin Harris Centre back in February, only weeks before the first lockdown. You can hear Ben in his alternative guise as a singer, performing 'Just Being Realistic' from the musical here.

The visuals and animators are created by Sam Gee, with the sound design by Dan Mawson, both of whom I've worked with on every leo&hyde production. But it's not just me who also likes working with them - it turns out that they're Manchester University regulars too. Dan actually leads the Klezmer ensemble performance module at University of Manchester’s music department, and is a former clarinettist in Klezmer band L’chaim Kapelye.

You can watch a short documentary about the ‘Vessels of Song': Journeys into the Worlds of Klezmer’ concert, commissioned by The University of Manchester, co-hosted by their Music Department and the Manchester Liberal Jewish Community, in his guise as a Klezmer clarinettist - in a video made by Sam!

Looking back at the creation of Scroll, it’s this collaborative aspect I’m particularly proud of, and which feels true to the collaborative text-making traditions its responding to. On its own, my poems would risk being tricky knots of language. But, with the contributions of actors and designers, the poems can open up.