Success for Lincolnshire playwright
Local playwright, Esme Waters, secures publication for debut play.
At the beginning of her career as an exciting new playwright, Esme Waters, a 22-year-old Lincolnshire graduate from the University of Nottingham, was delighted when Next Stage Press recently published her debut play Living with an Alien.
Esme first discovered playwriting at university and had success with her comedy-thriller Living with an Alien throughout 2023-24; the play was a finalist in both The Larking House Playwright's Intensive 2023 and The Depot for New Play Readings.
Described as "really exciting and unusual" (The Hope Theatre, London) and "powerfully suspenseful" (The Depot for New Play Readings), the play is a thriller, with strong comedic notes, in which a murder has occurred in an isolated village - but with a difference.
It would seem to have otherworldly origins. Michael, a resident in the village, is intrigued and soon discovers that his wife, Lara, is responsible for the crime, and has concealed her terrifying, true identity.
When suspicion falls on him, Michael realises the full extent of Lara's betrayal, and soon Michael and his uncle Frederick appear to be at her mercy. Denied access to outside help, they are forced to use their ingenuity to escape her non-human clutches.
Esme hopes to bring the play to Lincoln's performing arts scene. A link to her work can be found here: Living with an Alien - Next Stage Press.
She has recently completed her second comedy-thriller, Mr Thrushby's Adventure, and has similar hopes for publication and production.