Today at Fleet Towers

Things are hotting up, and then pissing down with rain the minute we finish rehearsing.

Me and the lovely Kate Fallon got swimming pool drenched on the way back from sunny/rainy/sunny/torrential Salford today. Luckily, it came after a superb day.

We did it. First full run through, with our new array of props and set. Yes, no-longer is our blue chair a record player, or the two red chairs a bed. It's amazing how much difference having a drinks trolley makes to an actor's performance...

We've been rehearsing, talking, rewriting, blocking, and all the rest of it for over a week now and you start to think that maybe you've written a three and a half hour epic. It's not. It's a 48 minute epic. And it works! My God, it works. Suddenly, all those questions that have been whirling around about whether there's enough of the end at the beginning fall away and it feels like a proper, proper play. I can't describe what a total narcissist, egotistical fool you feel when you laugh or are moved by something you've written, but then you have to remind yourself that you are, in fact, laughing at or moved by the brilliant actor who's taken your faintly funny, fairly emotive line and made it something much better.

And more... plans for Hampstead are in full swing too (and that's not 'til September). Ian Scully came down today to discuss set design for the London show. (I should explain, 24:7 is a truly fridge beast, where you have only 15 minutes to get the show up and 15 minutes to get your show down again.)

So yeah, all is good. We're even tentatively talking about the next play... very tentatively.