The Great Acting Blog: “Good Actors Are Incredibly Creative And Generous”

I came across a seemingly ghost-written autobiography by John Ellis, in which he relates the details of some of his more “famous” commissions. But he doesn’t give much away about his own feelings – and this is a man who ended up killing himself in a most horrific way.Another little fact gave me the idea of the play itself: After retiring from his post as executioner, John Ellis appeared in a play in Gravesend in 1927, playing a hangman. The melodrama, which he is believed to have bankrolled, gained a certain notoriety but was a dismal flop in the end. What on earth drove Ellis to put himself in the limelight in this way? My play is therefore set backstage, draws together the history of Ellis’s bizarre and ultimately tragic career, and is an imagined investigation of what it might mean to carry out legalised killing on behalf of the State.Researching the period detail was huge fun (I fell in love with the Jazz age music, the fashion and the world of silent movies on the eve of the arrival of the talkies in 1927), and I even got to carry out a bit of detective work, trawling the National Archives for details of Ellis’s involvement in Edith Thompson’s execution. The case files on Thompson’s trial and execution are officially closed till 2023, but there are tell-tale clues about what happened in the Archives.

It is my play, my idea and my writing – but in producing this first script I’ve learned a lot. The creative process should be a collaborative one – my actors and director have helped me to learn a little bit of creative humility, to be open to different ideas and to be prepared to let go of cherished old ideas along the way.

I can’t wait to do it all again!

TGAB: That’s great Maggie. Many thanks!

Maggie is currently running a Kickstarter campaign in order to raise funds for a performed reading of Hangman at the Tristan Bates Theatre. Check-out the campaign here.