This section provides background on the creation of Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons, and of the major players involved: Walrus (the company that created Lemons), Sam Steiner (the playwright), and the early production history of Lemons.
KEY PLAYERS
Lemons was created/devised by a group of theatre-makers under the company name Walrus. They were:
Writer: Sam Steiner
Director: Ed Franklin
Oliver: Euan Kitson
Bernadette: Beth Holmes
Writer: Sam Steiner
Director: Ed Franklin
Oliver: Euan Kitson
Bernadette: Beth Holmes
WALRUS / WARWICK
Walrus is the theatre company/collective who created Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons. They describe themselves as "a young company made up of graduates from the University of Warwick. We are interested in making work that is formally innovative, theatrically intimate, and concerned with finding new ways to stage our relationship with the world around us."
In an article from The Guardian in 2015, reporter Andrew Haydon asks why the three best shows he saw at that year's Edinburgh Fringe, one of which was Lemons, came out of the University of Warwick. He writes:
"Warwick has, in recent years, been one of the most politically active universities in terms of student protest. Several members of these three theatre companies took part in the occupation of the university Senate House Building in mid-2013 to campaign for free education and oppose the first of a series of pay rises awarded to Warwick’s vice-chancellor Nigel Thrift (a rise of £42,000 to £316,000 in the same year that lecturers were offered a 1% salary increase).
....when Walrus theatre’s Lemons... was first performed in January, the Caryl Churchill-like wordplay set in a future where the government has restricted word usage was understood more as a satire about social media. In the run-up to the election and beyond, audiences are now seeing the deprivations depicted in relation to austerity and class. On one hand, these are sobering, depressing pieces of work. These are theatre-makers who spent all but the first few years of their lives growing up in the shadow of the New Labour project – with Britain at war since 2001, with higher education always to be paid for, with everything privatised and with even their university calling the police to a peaceful, small-scale sit-down protest. On the other hand, the intelligence and energy of these pieces is a cause for optimism."
In an article from The Guardian in 2015, reporter Andrew Haydon asks why the three best shows he saw at that year's Edinburgh Fringe, one of which was Lemons, came out of the University of Warwick. He writes:
"Warwick has, in recent years, been one of the most politically active universities in terms of student protest. Several members of these three theatre companies took part in the occupation of the university Senate House Building in mid-2013 to campaign for free education and oppose the first of a series of pay rises awarded to Warwick’s vice-chancellor Nigel Thrift (a rise of £42,000 to £316,000 in the same year that lecturers were offered a 1% salary increase).
....when Walrus theatre’s Lemons... was first performed in January, the Caryl Churchill-like wordplay set in a future where the government has restricted word usage was understood more as a satire about social media. In the run-up to the election and beyond, audiences are now seeing the deprivations depicted in relation to austerity and class. On one hand, these are sobering, depressing pieces of work. These are theatre-makers who spent all but the first few years of their lives growing up in the shadow of the New Labour project – with Britain at war since 2001, with higher education always to be paid for, with everything privatised and with even their university calling the police to a peaceful, small-scale sit-down protest. On the other hand, the intelligence and energy of these pieces is a cause for optimism."
CREATIVE PROCESS
In an interview with Exeunt Magazine, the Walrus team describes how they made Lemons, and how reactions to the show shifted over time.
"Its creation process was incredibly collaborative and Sam wrote specifically for Beth and Euan. 'I wasn’t expecting something quite so tailored', Euan admits. 'Beth and I got a play in which we are very much part of the DNA'. They spent a weekend in Warwick improvising around Sam’s initial script to get a better sense of the characters. Beth admits how much the improvisation terrified her. 'I’d never done it in the knowledge that the material I was coming up with could be used in the script.' Being such good friends has helped the process feel comfortable. 'It wasn’t necessarily a self-conscious, 'Oh god, the writer’s in the room!' thing', Euan says, 'it felt totally natural.' Ed echoes this feeling. 'It felt safe to push when you felt that something was worth pushing. I guess that’s also how friendships work, that people stop you when you’re getting things wrong and if you really care about something they let you run with it.'
....Sam is thrilled at the different stances critics have taken on the show. 'They’ve found so much more in Lemons than I could ever have put into it. I was going to say it makes me feel like a fraud but it doesn’t because I think writing is planting enough seeds so that audiences can go and form their own ideas.'
Has the public eye on new writing coming out of Warwick put pressure on Walrus? 'I only feel pressure because I’m so proud of what all the other companies have done.' Beth explains. 'You want to live up to the high expectations but at the same you can’t live your whole life wanting to impress someone.' Ed agrees that it’s 'more a pressure to work hard.' Beth continues, 'We started doing Lemons because we felt like what we were saying with it was important. That’s how theatre should be made, not because you want to retain a level of respect from other people.'”
"Its creation process was incredibly collaborative and Sam wrote specifically for Beth and Euan. 'I wasn’t expecting something quite so tailored', Euan admits. 'Beth and I got a play in which we are very much part of the DNA'. They spent a weekend in Warwick improvising around Sam’s initial script to get a better sense of the characters. Beth admits how much the improvisation terrified her. 'I’d never done it in the knowledge that the material I was coming up with could be used in the script.' Being such good friends has helped the process feel comfortable. 'It wasn’t necessarily a self-conscious, 'Oh god, the writer’s in the room!' thing', Euan says, 'it felt totally natural.' Ed echoes this feeling. 'It felt safe to push when you felt that something was worth pushing. I guess that’s also how friendships work, that people stop you when you’re getting things wrong and if you really care about something they let you run with it.'
....Sam is thrilled at the different stances critics have taken on the show. 'They’ve found so much more in Lemons than I could ever have put into it. I was going to say it makes me feel like a fraud but it doesn’t because I think writing is planting enough seeds so that audiences can go and form their own ideas.'
Has the public eye on new writing coming out of Warwick put pressure on Walrus? 'I only feel pressure because I’m so proud of what all the other companies have done.' Beth explains. 'You want to live up to the high expectations but at the same you can’t live your whole life wanting to impress someone.' Ed agrees that it’s 'more a pressure to work hard.' Beth continues, 'We started doing Lemons because we felt like what we were saying with it was important. That’s how theatre should be made, not because you want to retain a level of respect from other people.'”
In the Foreward to the published script of Lemons, Director Ed Franklin says this:
"So much of this spirit of contrast is contained in the manner in which the play was made: Sam's compelling, singular voice responding to a profoundly generous process of collaboration. Beth and Euan have been on board from the very beginning, and Bernadette and Oliver have them -- and their brave, bright, tireless commitment to exploring these characters -- at the core of their DNA.
In one sense, it is odd to think of Lemons being set down in print as a published volume, in that it has always felt less like a fixed entity than a living, breathing reflection of the work we do as a company. But more than that, it is ineffably exciting: for Sam, whose writing deserves to be read often and widely, and for Walrus, for whom this book serves as a testament to the warm and winding road which we have travelled so far."
"So much of this spirit of contrast is contained in the manner in which the play was made: Sam's compelling, singular voice responding to a profoundly generous process of collaboration. Beth and Euan have been on board from the very beginning, and Bernadette and Oliver have them -- and their brave, bright, tireless commitment to exploring these characters -- at the core of their DNA.
In one sense, it is odd to think of Lemons being set down in print as a published volume, in that it has always felt less like a fixed entity than a living, breathing reflection of the work we do as a company. But more than that, it is ineffably exciting: for Sam, whose writing deserves to be read often and widely, and for Walrus, for whom this book serves as a testament to the warm and winding road which we have travelled so far."
PRODUCTION HISTORY
Lemons premiered at the Warwick Arts Centre in January 2015. Then, it was presented at the National Student Drama Festival in March 2015 where it won three awards, including judges' commendations for writing and direction.
The production was presented at the Latitude Festival in July 2015 before a hit, sell-out run at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. It transferred to the Camden People's Theatre on November 24, 2015. After, Lemons toured the UK throughout 2016.
The production was presented at the Latitude Festival in July 2015 before a hit, sell-out run at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. It transferred to the Camden People's Theatre on November 24, 2015. After, Lemons toured the UK throughout 2016.
SAM STEINER
"Sam is a playwright and screenwriter from Manchester. Sam’s debut play, the award-winning Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons, was produced by Walrus Theatre (a company he cofounded). It has had three sell-out runs at the Edinburgh Fringe and toured nationally. The play has since been produced all over the world in seven different languages. Sam’s second play, Kanye The First, was commissioned and produced by Hightide Theatre and premiered at the festival in September 2017. Other pieces of Sam’s work have been showcased at the Royal Exchange, Soho Theatre, Southwark Playhouse, Sala Beckett in Barcelona and Cannes Film Festival. He completed an attachment at Paines Plough as their Playwright Fellowship and holds an MA in Screenwriting from the National Film and Television School. Sam is currently under commission at Paines Plough and is developing a television project with Drama Republic."
Sam's Other Work:
Sam's Other Work:
- Kanye The First
- "Annie's not really a fan of herself. But what if everyone thought she was someone else? Someone different. Someone better.
- Sam Steiner's Kanye the First is a dazzlingly funny and original drama about identity, guilt, contemporary culture and the second coming of Kanye West. It was first performed as part of HighTide Festival 2017, in a co-production between HighTide and Paul Jellis, in association with The Marlowe and The North Wall."
- You Stupid Darkness!
- “I just think it’s, you know, important to look at the good things that are happening as well.”
Everything’s been falling apart for a while now. In a cramped, crumbling office four volunteers spend a few hours every Tuesday night on the phone to strangers telling them everything is going to be ok. As the outside world disintegrates around them, Frances, Joey, Angie and Jon teeter on the edge of their own personal catastrophes. Their hopes and fears become entangled as they try, desperately, to connect with the callers and with each other.
An urgent play from rising star Sam Steiner about the struggle for optimism and community amid the chaos of a collapsing world.
“Hello. Brightline. You’re through to someone you can talk to…”
- “I just think it’s, you know, important to look at the good things that are happening as well.”
Follow Sam on Twitter at @SamSteiner7