LS2 chats to Leeds playwright Mike Bartlett

Love Love Love is a new play by writer Mike Bartlett, a graduate of Leeds University, which explores the baby boom generation as it retires, and their relationships with the less successful’ generations after it. It’s a play about generational conflict, love, family and responsibility. It’s on at the West Yorkshire Playhouse from 5th – 9th April and tickets start from £10.

What was your inspiration for Love Love Love?
I don’t think I’d call it inspiration, that’s too strong. I was thinking about what people of my own age thought about what their parents had at a similar age. My generation were living in small flats starting to have families but feeling like they didn’t have as much as their parents did at the same stage of life.

What do you want your audience to take away from the play?
Whatever they want really. It’s not my business to tell the audience what to think; they’re clever people who have minds of their own. All I want to do is stage an interesting story with interesting characters that talks about something important but is also entertaining. I want it to provoke you into thinking about the subject and hopefully maybe apply it your own experience, but I certainly don’t have a view that I want the audience to think. Also, because there are two intervals between the three eras of the play, the audience can think about each act in between.

Is it nice to have a play on in Leeds where you started out?
Yes, it’s brilliant, I used to go to the West Yorkshire Playhouse as a student and go to the bar afterwards to talk about what we’d seen. It was an ideal night out for me. What I hope about the play is that it appeals to all generations, including students.

What did you do at university to help you get where you are now?
I studied English and Theatre Studies. It was great; there were brilliant lecturers and it was a good mixture of rigorous academic discipline and total freedom to experiment and make theatre. We made weird and possibly quite bad theatre, but it’s through doing that that you learn how to experiment and who you are as an artist. You make mistakes and it was a great opportunity to practice. I also wrote plays for the Theatre Group and took some to Edinburgh which was a great experience.

How did being writer in residence at the Royal Court help you develop as a writer?
It’s a huge gesture of confidence. What the Royal Court are fantastic at is saying you’ve written one play and instead of saying well done, they say we hope you’ll write a lot more and give you the resources and the time to do it. The best thing you can do with an artist is show confidence in their work, and their work of the future. I was lucky enough to have that.

What was it like winning an Olivier Award and getting that recognition?
Surreal and weird. You stand up with Maggie Smith sitting in front of you and James Earl Jones (Darth Vader) at the table behind, and you deliver a half thought out inarticulate speech that you didn’t prepare because you didn’t think you’d win. The best thing about it is that it might give people confidence that this play is good.

 

words: Alice Shinkfield