Minutes of the meeting at La Rosa Hotel on the above date.

Present: Adele, Gill, Ian, Jan, Jenny, John, Kaz, Magda, Suzanne. Plus guests: Antony, Linda, Robbie, Shona.

Apologies: Laura, Michele, Pip.

Topic: A Play Reading: Honestly by Antony Bellekom.

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The Play

Ian welcomed our guests: Antony Bellekom, of Dogwood Theatre Productions, and his team: Linda, Robbie and Shona. This was the occasion of a second visit to Whitby Writers Group by Antony and Robbie, who were last here in May, 2024 to perform a play reading of Facing the Waves. See Minutes |23 May 2024.
Ian then ceded the Chair to Antony, to present his latest play.

Antony then talked about his BBC experience as the producer of The Archers, the genesis of Dogwood and the play Honestly which they are currently developing.
The play is based on a contemporary cause célèbre involving a good-looking woman of 26 who posed as a minor to attend several schools, also as a French au-pair to win the trust of a family whose baby she abducts (and incidentally takes good care of).

CHLOE (played by Shona) is a compulsive liar and small-time criminal. She is being interviewed by EMMA (played by Robbie), a psychologist working for a company that produces assessment reports for the law courts. CHLOE has been found guilty of a large number of criminal offences, carried out under some 100 aliases in several countries, the most serious being the kidnapping of a baby entrusted to her care. The length of CHLOE’s prison sentence will depend in part on EMMA’s report.

RUTH (played by Adele) is a friend of EMMA. They meet regularly to chat and drink wine.

HEAD1 and HEAD2 (both played by Antony) are the head teachers of schools which CHLOE has fraudulently attended, and the MOTHER (played by Linda) of the baby abducted by CHLOE.

First arrested for shoplifting, CHLOE asks for a further 43 offences to be taken into consideration. Further crimes emerge, including posing as a nanny with false references. EMMA, interviewing CHLOE, is unable to establish the truth of any details of her life as provided by CHLOE, beyond the crimes for which she has been arrested: shoplifting, impersonation and kidnapping, none of which the prisoner denies.

CHLOE is highly intelligent and well able to defend herself and her outlook on life. She casts plausible doubt on the value of anything that EMMA plans to write in her report, exposes the hypocrisy of everyone she has to deal with and succeeds in making EMMA question her own integrity and professionality, not to say the very nature of truth itself.

The play reading ended with ample time for discussion, during which numerous observations and suggestions were made for its improvement. Antony thanked the meeting for its valuable feedback, and Ian thanked Dogwood Theatre Productions on behalf of Whitby Writers Group for their visit and their entertaining and thought-provoking presentation.

The meeting closed at 1:00 PM.