This Easter look out for the video release of 'Tales from the Mad House', a series of eight 14-minute monologues.
Shown on the BBC over a week during Easter of last year, the films are windows into the worlds of eight people who have all missed their moment with one man - Jesus Christ.
Set within the dusty confines of a dilapidated Victorian asylum, each monologue reveals to us how each narrator has lived since that missed moment. We meet characters whose identities are slowly revealed to us through their stories - people such as the Centurion, the Serving Girl, the Best Friend...
Norman Stone is the director of four of the films and producer of the series. We met in London to talk about the project, how it came about and issues raised in the making of the programmes.
Theatre vs. telly
With a background in art college, studying graphics, film and television, Norman Stone went to the Royal College of Art and left in 1975 with a Masters degree in Film and Television. Since joining the BBC that year, he has worked in a variety of genres including animation, documentaries and children's television, working on the first children's morning show, 'The Sunday Gang'. Music videos for crooners Robson and Jerome followed, as did an ITV drama featuring them, 'Ain't Misbehaving', and a documentary on Dudley Moore, shown last year. He won a BAFTA and an Emmy for his BBC production of Shadowlands, which starred Joss Ackland as C.S. Lewis.
He first began to have the idea for what would become 'Tales from the Mad House', when he saw some one-man shows done by Murray Watts at the Upstream Theatre. 'I thought, that's what theatre can have over telly - it can make you sweat and think and go "whoa". But I thought, that's nonsense. Telly should at least be able to do something like that. So Murray and I got together and dreamt up the idea of doing a one-man show, on location, with a star ...' This resulted in the production of The Dream, a one-man show based on Dostoevsky's short story 'Dream of a Ridiculous Man' as produced for the BBC in 1991. Stone says: 'The theory was you could do really powerful, strong, entertaining and moving dramas for the price of a little documentary. And you have this quality - guaranteed stories, guaranteed savings, guaranteed stars. Who would object?'
Religion at the BBC
Stone came up with the basis for the 'Tales' when he found that the Religious Department of the BBC hadn't yet filled the slots for their regular broadcast, the 'Easter Tales'. He asked them: 'Why don't you do some one man shows?', and they agreed. Stone's vision for the project came while he was working on the 'Miss Marple' programmes for BBC1, and began imagining the idea of an older woman with a tale to tell. 'I thought, wouldn't it be interesting to find her in some sort of real location setting, and discover that it's some sort of crazy house, or mad house, or old home at the turn of the century, which would necessarily dislocate us, and not know who she is. '
'I used to dance'
'She meets us and she says: "I was a lovely girl. I used to dance, you know", and it turns out at the end - punchline, punchline - she's Salome!'. The idea of mysterious people with dramatic pasts, hidden away in a Victorian asylum, began to take shape. 'It's just a lovely idea that you could watch somebody by being a visitor, they'd want to talk to you, you're allowed time with them. They wouldn't explain who they were, you'd pick up the clues'. A perfect location was found; an uninhabited, rambling house in Dunbartonshire. A group of acclaimed and talented writers and actors began to assemble.
The cast was a dream line-up, from established actors of stage and screen, such as Joss Ackland (Stone's Shadowlands), and Jonathan Pryce ('Evita', Stone's 'Martin Luther - Heretic'), to newer actresses such as Helen Baxendale. Peter France, seen in the 'Tales' as the Rich Man, had previously worked with Stone on another 'Easter Tales' project entitled 'The Journey' (1997/98), which charted his journey towards Christianity. France was one of the actors who both wrote and starred in their 'Tale'; another was Tony Robinson, seen to devastating effect in 'The Best Friend'.
Missed their moment
So how did the cast and writers deal with the essentially Christian nature of the stories? How were the stories perceived and presented by the mixture of Christian and non-Christian personnel? Stone: 'These are Christian stories, these are people who have all missed their moment with the same person, and regretted it for the rest of their lives. And although it's nicely dislocated in fairly recent time, 100 years ago, you can pick it all up quite usefully. Certain writers were Christians, certain weren't.
'Certain actors understood more of what was required of them. But the idea was, if people were honest enough...One of the writers said: "I'm not a Christian" and I said: "That's fine - are you honest?". And he said yes, and I said: "Then you'll do"'. Stone's approach was to encourage the honesty of the situation, emphasising the personal approach. In this way, viewers could identify with the character's situation, connecting with such themes as guilt, shame, grief and anger. Stone describes how the Tales spoke to people in this way, citing 'The Centurion', which starred James Cosmo, as an example. 'The blatant honesty ... I've never seen him perform better. It's just little ways he says things, and it cuts straight through to my soul'.
Having to think
In this way, it was possible to create moving, powerful dramas which, although centred on biblical characters, were not directly preaching at the audience. Stone explains: 'You're not lecturing the audience, saying, 'Aha! You shouldn't have missed this moment with Jesus Christ!' but you're seeing somebody else. I wanted to move people so they'd say: 'No, no! Don't you see?' and by doing that it's like watching someone in a mirror; you see yourself as much as them'. Stone remembers a conversation he had with Murray Watts, screenwriter of 'The Miracle Maker': 'I said to him: "Why do you write screenplays? Why do you write plays?" and he said: "I want to make people feel so much they can't help but think"'. Watts achieved this with 'The Miracle Maker', the animated film of the life of Christ which received wide-ranging critical acclaim from both religious and secular circles.
Norman Stone has similarly done so with 'Tales from the Mad House'. The characters draw you in, reach into your heart and soul, wring out your emotions and leave a deep, lasting impression. And as a result, you are encouraged to think about what you have just seen: 'Because you're actually kicking (the viewer) or luring them or tricking them, not into believing what you're saying, but thinking, considering to opening up. And that's what I wanted these things to do ... It's telling a story; if it's true to the human condition, and if it's true enough to the situation you're getting it from, it isn't an attempt to bushwhack or ambush people. It's an attempt to say: "Come here, come closer. This is an interesting story. Don't watch it if you don't want to. But listen to this". And you get into it, and even if you never made a connection with it, you didn't know anything from the Bible or anything, you would still find it a darn good tale'.
Reactions to the series have been encouraging. Impressed viewers were disappointed that the films were screened late at night, wanting them to be shown at a more accessible time. Christian and secular press were equally admiring. The Royal Television Society gave Helen Baxendale the Best Actress award for 'The Servant Girl', and nominated James Cosmo's Centurion for Best Actor.
'Whatever God wants'
Norman Stone's next release will be 'The M-Word', an educational video produced in association with CARE Education, promoting the value of marriage. Aimed at 14-16 year-olds, the video uses humour and style and aims to be a discussion starter among this age group in youth groups, churches and schools. Stone, who directed and produced the film, describes the project's aim as: 'To attract the viewer's attention and promote thought and discussion on a topic all too absent from their own lives and experience'.
In terms of other work, Stone would like to return to drama, other documentaries, comedy drama... 'I'm open to whatever I hope God wants me to do'.
'Tales from the Mad House' is available now on video and comes with a useful booklet featuring interesting drama and discussion ideas.
TALES FROM THE MAD HOUSE
Cert. 15, The Bible Society, £14
BBC/1A Productions, 2000
Starring Claire Bloom, James Cosmo, Tony Robinson, Joss Ackland, Helen Baxendale, Peter France, Jonathan Pryce and Eileen Atkins. Directed by Morag Fullerton, David Hayman, Denny Lawrence and Norman Stone.
Series produced by Norman Stone.
