January 2020 – Amateur Dramatics
I joined a new afternoon adult drama group at my local theatre. It was a small but very supportive and fun group.
I wrote three short scenes for all 6 of us to act out within class. We did two of them within the term, and were due to do the third, the week theatres all had to close in March 2020.
April 2020 – Music Video
In April 2020, Finnish (rock and pop) a cappella group FORK had a new song out, their cover of The Pretender by the Foo Fighters. Since getting together to do a video wasn’t such an easy option at the time, they asked fans to do their own video interpretation of the song, and send in their clips. I saw a FORK gig live in Oxford a few years ago & have loved them ever since. I dressed up in a similar kitsch way to how they did, and sent in my contribution. Happily, they used lots of my clips! My full video can be found on my YouTube channel. But here is FORKs finished video with everyone’s fabulous clips. Can you spot me?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=juRiyjF3n68
July 2020 – Radio Play
In July 2020 Chipping Norton theatre ran a competition ‘Speak as One’ to hear from voices in the community, to write scripts for short radio plays to be professionally recorded. I wrote & entered three, and one, ‘Mrs Powers’ was happily chosen to be recorded! It has had positive reviews from friends & strangers alike. You can hear it on the link below:
https://soundcloud.com/user-305148713/mrs-powers-by-sarah-turner-trigger-warning
Sept 2020 – Writing & Casting a stage play
The small drama group sadly closed for good due to lack of members, however my time with AmDram wasn’t over, and I strove to get onto the mostly full, much larger evening AmDram group. I was successful and joined them when they re-started online in September 2020. They were very welcoming and I soon felt at home.
Having heard my radio play, the tutor asked if I had a play written for 16 people? I said no, but I would gladly give it a go. I wrote one scene & it was given the go-ahead for our June 2021 production, until classes had to remain online. However it was guaranteed to be our play for June 2022.
June 2021 – Film
As we were unable to resume in-person classes still come 2021, our tutor devised and directed an idea for a film recorded solely through our Zoom classes, edited together by a talented fellow actor in our group, and which would premiere on YouTube. We each came up with our characters back story, name, costume, set and our own scripts.
Our debut film ‘A road to Nowhere?’ is the fabulous result. I highly recommend watching the whole thing all the way through, but if you just want to watch my parts in it, for now, then start at 18.48 mins in where I do a two minute monologue. Then skip to 34.11 mins in, for the start of the group scenes, in which I do some silent reacting, and have two shorter speaking parts as well. Keep watching to the end of the film, as the captions added by our editor are a good laugh to end with.
June 2022 – Stage Play
Spring 2022 I finished writing my stage play ‘Virtually There’. After approximately 12hrs worth of scheduled rehearsals over a couple of months, on Tuesday 21st June 2022, Chipping Norton Adult Drama were back on stage after a three year gap!
It was my stage acting debut and playwrighting debut!
Sit back and enjoy my fabulous fellow cast members, brilliantly bring my script off the page and into the theatre. Tickets were free, but still over 43% of the seats were taken, which is brilliant for an Amdram production of an unknown play. Please do comment with your thoughts, under the video on YouTube. Further below here are reviews we’ve had so far.
Play Reviews:
21.6.22 – It was great. I thought it was really well written, not only producing laughs from the audience, but also touching upon some very current subject areas. I hope you’re equally as pleased, because you should be! We should definitely go for a drink to celebrate! – HN.
21.6.22 – Enjoyed your play, clever girl. – SM
22.6.22 – Well done Sarah, what a success!! We had a great night thank you!! I hope you were very pleased! I really hope everybody took something away with them. Very thought provoking!!! – SW & friend.
22.6.22 – You did a great job for your first effort. Well done. – JB
22.6.22 – I thought it was great, thoroughly enjoyed it. My friend had trouble because she’s deaf, most of the actors were fine, but some didn’t throw their voices as far as us, but she enjoyed it too. Sorry that was not meant to be a bad criticism. – AD & friend.
22.6.22 – Were you and your co actors pleased with the response from the audience? I don’t think I grasped your idea of our ‘virtual reality lives’ maybe you could enlighten me next time we meet. Well done you, and all your colleagues. I think it’s a great achievement. – PL
22.6.22 – I’m glad you all enjoyed putting on your play. It wasn’t really my sort of thing but everyone else in the audience was clapping and enjoying themselves which was great. – JK
22.6.22 – Sarah, I have been mulling over my trip to the theatre last night. I am truly in awe of your skills. To explore such a topic, to write the dialogue, the stage directions. Your concept was just brilliant and the execution extremely courageous and professional. Thank you so much for inviting me. I feel sure I saw something truly special and I feel very privileged. Thank you. Thank you. – EJ
22.6.22 – Sarah, just a quick note to say how very much we enjoyed your play last night…so well written, well observed and funny! The cast did it proud … and we appreciated all the wonderful costumes and props too!! It was clearly enjoyed by the whole audience. Many thanks for suggesting we come. Best wishes – JT & KR
22.6.22 – Huge congratulations on the show last night. You should be very proud of your script, and the performances that it conjured from your fellow actors. We’re looking forward to seeing what you write next! We did raise some good funds from the audience last night, which will make a real difference. We had 86 people in the audience in the end, which is an excellent number. – WA
22.6.22 – Well done to you and the rest of the group for putting on such a wonderful performance! The play was a great success and we are very proud of having such a fantastic Adult Drama Group as part of our programme. – VM
10.7.22 – I really enjoyed the play, a massive well done to you! It was lovely seeing everyone again and so nice to see a performance on the stage again after so long. – LJ
22.7.22 – (Viewed the recording) – Well done to you and your fellow thespian’s on putting on a play which is a sensitive subject. – PM
25.07.22 – (Viewed the recording & saw it live) – I enjoyed it as much or more than the first time around. – JM
28.07.22 – (Viewed the recording) – What fun! Thanks for sharing your work with me. You should be very proud of your artistic achievements! Glad the play was such a success. – AW
04.08.22 – (Viewed the recording) It was really good! Well done. Quite funny in places. – NL
01.09.22 – (Viewed the recording) – As a first effort it was very well done, although a bit sad. Continue with your efforts for a second play. Didn’t know you were so talented. – SG & EG
Sept 2022 – Stand up gig
After a great 2-day intensive online course learning all the techniques for stand-up comedy, by comic Jay Sodagar and Laughing Horse Comedy; the next night, we students (there were 2 guys and I, this video is just me, I went second) did our first public (online) stand-up (well, sitting down), comedy gig – to a good response & laughter! There were about 12 people in the online audience, but we all have to start somewhere! Another friend also recorded it for me but on gallery view, so it was nice to see more people at once, all laughing, as I had it on spotlight view, as per the video below. I know I rushed through my script & should have paused more for laughter but otherwise it was good, and I’ve had some good reviews from friends & acquaintances alike. See below video for the comments. Please comment on the video page on YouTube if you enjoyed my set. If you didn’t, please share it with those you don’t like!
Gig Reviews:
05.09.22 – Saw it live online – Very good Sarah, I hope you heard me laughing……Well when it is funny, all you can do is laugh [lots of laughing emoji’s]. – SM
05.09.22 – Saw it live online – You were great! – HN
05.09.22 – Saw it live online – Thanks Sarah, I really enjoyed it. Look forward to the next one. – AW
06.09.22 – Saw recording – I must admit I seldom watch stand-up comedy. Wow Bravo because it’s very hard to entertain an audience nonstop. I did laugh at some of it. Be proud. – NM
07.09.22 – Saw recording – Well done Sarah [3 clapping emoji] Very good! – NL
07.09.22 – Saw recording – Really enjoyed that Sarah, well done you. Bet you’re well chuffed with that. You have a look of Sarah Millican. – AB
08.09.22 – Saw recording – Great stand up although you were sitting down!! Very funny I had a grin on my face for it all. Good rhythm, biographical and current. Congratulations loved it. – AB (different person to the above AB!)
08.09.22 – Saw recording – Well done Sarah, it certainly made me laugh. – AD
June 2023 – Stage play
The outline was devised by our drama tutor, a day in the life of a GP surgery. In pairs or small groups we devised and improvised our skits with various health issues to focus on as we chose. Most of us were in two, as am I, though have more to say in my second one. The two follow on from each other. If you only have time to watch my stage time for now, then start at 5.34 mins in and I exit at 12.44 mins. But if you have time do watch the whole 42 mins as it is very funny in parts and moving in others.
Fan fiction
I wrote my first fanfic in 2002, but didn’t know of anywhere at that time to showcase it online. Then I forgot about it and moved onto other interests.
My passion for writing took off in Winter 2016 when I found a site to upload to. That was the start of my many stories, loosely based on, mostly lesbian character pairings in TV shows: Bad Girls, Holby City, and Emmerdale.
You don’t need to follow the programmes or know the characters to still enjoy my stories.
The stories started off as prose, then I tried writing in script style, and found I preferred it.
Some of my stories, usually the ones with many chapters (and many ‘comments’, ‘kudos’, and ‘hits’ from fanfic fans!) contain adult themed material. But if you don’t want to read that part you can just scroll on down, it’s not the main part of the stories. If you do enjoy any of my work please do give kudos or comment if you can. It’s lovely to get feedback on my writing where it is showcased. Thank you.
Here’s where you can find them: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SLTventures/works
YouTube Channel
The majority of my videos feature my photos and film of local nature walks. I love Trees, so they feature heavily!
There are also some videos related to my Amdram; and also Days out and places I have enjoyed exploring.
You can even see my TV debut from the early 1990s!
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC96DHTecZeZQ5Unv5FUD5_Q/videos
Please do subscribe to the channel, and ‘like’ my videos. Thank you.
women, you, are 