"I just wanted to express my gratitude and thanks for sharing your knowledge, and delivering a genuinely insightful workshop yesterday afternoon. I'd like to stay in contact with you, as I really enjoyed your teaching style and honestly learnt (and am still learning) a lot. Currently going through your worthwhile video watch, and its really helping my acting and writing character development. If you ever need someone to big you up, or even support any future workshops you have going on let me know and I'm there." - Another happy customer.
The ERIC Fest is an annual celebration of creativity. The whole day and night is packed with creative opportunities, with aims to empower and connect aspiring practitioners to creative brands, employers and exciting new projects. This year, ERIC partnered with Pop Brixton and ELEVATE to host Brixton's largest creative careers event.
Live music, Q&A sessions, exhibitions and artwork adorned the area. The buzz was non-stop, and I'm pleased to say that my creative writing workshop on character development was not only sold out, but was OVER SUBSCRIBED!
I teamed with the BFI to deliver another creative writing session on character development. Using some of the exercises outlined in the Bring Your Character to Life nano course, the workshop participants developed in-depth character profiles and monologues. They could either use the time to create a character completely from scratch, or for a current work-in-progress.
Subsequently, they partnered with the person next to them, and with writing prompts, created a scene of dialogue between their characters. It was amazing to see how quickly the participants adapted to a new environment - going from working completely independently, to discussing and negotiating story ideas and narratives with people they'd never met before - a valuable skill to have given that a professional writer can go from weeks of solitude, to standing their ground in a writers' room within a matter of hours!
Everyone at the table was pleasantly surprised by what they were able to achieve in less than an hour. The lesson I hoped they took away was, that if they ever doubted their ability to create and pitch, or if ever they tricked themselves into believing there is not enough time in the day to write, they can dispel their own myths by reaching into their memory box, and reminding themselves of what they managed to achieve in such a short time, amidst a vibrant and busy central London festival! The glowing feedback I saw in my inbox the next morning (copied above) was proof that the message was well-received.
I'd like to thank Mark Reid, the BFI and ERIC Fest for inviting me to be part of such an incredible experience. I'd also like to thank my sidekick, Jenna Pollard, for her invaluable support throughout the day - filming, editing and veggie burger suggestions made what was already a great day, a truly magical one!