This is one out of three Q&A's from the creative minds behind Sanctuary. 

Award-winning playwright and campaigner Sarah Woods has co-created Sanctuary with Boff Whalley. Here, Sarah discusses the origins of the musical, the importance of artistic collaboration, and why theatre can help tackle serious subjects.

Where did the idea Sanctuary come from? 

Boff and I have been collaborating for a while now. We’ve done quite a lot of work  co-creating community pieces, largely for Welsh National Opera, with people seeking  refuge and asylum, and this was a story that we came to over a number of years. We also set up an organisation called Artists in Exile, a not-for-profit group which supports artists who want to come to the UK because they can’t stay in their own  country. So we have a lot of experience of working closely with people in this area.  There’s a dominant narrative, not just in this country, that immigration is going up  and that’s why people can’t get a doctor’s appointment or a job, and that’s not the  truth of the situation. So we wanted to counter this in a way that draws out the  different viewpoints and lays them out to the audience through the story of an  individual. 

Why did you decide to tell this story as a musical rather than say a drama? 

The ability for a character to express themselves in music enables us to move  beyond the everyday. At its heart it’s a way for people to communicate deep and  profound emotions and tell a story with real immediacy. It’s not agitprop, or polemic,  we want to invite the audience in and to think about other people’s lived experiences. 

How and why did you start collaborating with Boff? 

It was about six years ago. I was writing a musical called The Ruff Tuff Cream Puff  Estate Agency and me and Adrian Jackson [the director] came across Boff’s work at  the funeral of Heathcote Williams, who wrote the original work the musical was  based on, and a song that Boff had written for him was played at the end and we  were just blown away by it. So we got in touch with Boff and arranged to meet up. We talked to him about the possibility of him being the composer on Ruff Tuff and he  said ‘yes’ – and we’ve worked together consistently ever since on a wide variety of  projects. 

This is the first time you have worked with Red Ladder. What was the appeal in  working with the company? 

I’ve known about Red Ladder’s work for decades and Rod Dixon, the previous  artistic director, knew of my work too. We probably should have done stuff together  years ago but just didn’t get round to it. So now that it’s happening it feels like a very  natural meeting of hearts and minds. 

How different is it collaborating with someone on a project compared to  writing a play, or musical, on your own? 

I really enjoy collaborating not only with Boff but also co-creating with communities.  It’s a fantastic experience. For Boff and I, it enables us to travel through the whole  process with somebody else, which gives you a huge amount of support, not just 

practically in terms of not being on your own, but also imaginatively and creatively  we’re able to push each further which helps us take more creative risks. I feel we  become more than the sum of our parts. 

What are the challenges in writing a musical compared to a play or a radio  drama? 

With a musical you’re always thinking about what different jobs the songs are going  to do. You’re not reliant on the dramatic dialogue for the whole of the story. When  you work in different mediums like I do it’s about remembering to let the songs do the  work, because you want the music and songs to do all the key jobs of a classic  narrative like revealing the characters, moving the plot forward and telling the story. 

How important is drama, whether it’s a play, a novel, or a musical, in tackling  serious subjects? 

It’s really important, particularly right now, at a time of enormous cultural shift and  evolution. The narrative arts do two things – they show us where we are, like  Hamlet’s mirror, holding a mirror up to society. And they also have the ability to make  clear what we might do next, to inspire us to take action. As human beings, our  emotions lead our decision making and we have a huge capacity for empathetic  connection – and I think stories can help us with both of these things. 

Are there underlying themes that connect your work? 

All of my work uses stories for social good, to enable us to locate ourselves and to  consider what we might do about where we are. I work around what I think are some  of the big challenges we have right now, so lots of work around climate change,  environmental degradation and the increasing inequalities in the world.  What do you hope audiences take away from watching Sanctuary? I hope that people understand a little bit more about the hostile environment we have  created in this country for people who are really just seeking safety and asylum. And  to understand the extent of the hostility and the way some far right groups are  fuelling really pernicious and false narratives. A lot of the artists Boff and I have  supported, similar to Alland the lead character in this musical, were forced to leave  their country because they stood up for what they believed in. They’ve done things  that many of us might not have the bravery to do and these are people who we can learn a lot from.

You can see Sanctuary on Wednesday 9 October.

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