Theatre in Education – why does it work?
Mark Wheeller (left) has written a number of road safety plays, including two of the most famous – Too Much Punch For Judy and Why Did The Chicken Cross The Road? In this interview we find out how Mark came to be involved with road safety and why he feels live theatre is an excellent medium to engage young audiences.

To begin with Mark, can you tell us a little about yourself and what you do?
I am a drama teacher who writes plays for youth theatres.

Normally youth theatres present plays that were originally presented by professionals, but with my work generally the youth theatre trials the play and then it goes on to be performed by professionals. This is unique as far as I am aware.

I also direct a youth theatre group, Oaklands Youth Theatre, as part of my teaching contract. Most recently it has produced a play written by me about a missing teenager, Daniel Nolan.

So how did you come to be involved in road safety drama?
By chance.

Back in 1987 I was writing a play about alcohol misuse and one aspect of this was drink driving. I felt that this part of the play - a fifteen minute section of what later became Too Much Punch for Judy (right) - worked particularly well and so I developed it. At that point David Lindsay - who is now the county RSO in North Yorkshire - spotted it and put it into every school in Essex, and the rest is history.

Since then Too Much Punch has toured all over the world and was at one stage the most performed play in New Zealand, relegating John Godber's popular play Bouncers to second place! It wasn’t written as a road safety piece - perhaps this is where its success lies...

The popularity of Too Much Punch led to another play - Why Did The Chicken Cross The Road…Because Some Stupid Turkey Egged Her On (!!). After this, a number of road safety authorities clubbed together and commissioned a third play, Legal Weapon.

(See the footnote at the end of this interview for brief details about each of these plays).

I was also offered and accepted the job of writing the revamped TUFTY stories, which I understand RSO's are not keen on. But my wife and I had great fun writing them and I thought they were really good. Who knows, one day they may become cult storybooks - here's hoping!
I have also written some road safety tutorial programmes for schools.

These were commissioned by Oxfordshire County Council.

Is any of your road safety work currently being toured?
Yes, at the moment all three plays are on tour.

The Ape Theatre Company is touring Legal Weapon and Too Much Punch, while the StopWatch Theatre Company is presenting Why Did The Chicken Cross The Road.

And my latest play, The Gate Escape – which is about truancy - is also being toured by the Haymarket Theatre, Basingstoke.

And are you working on any road safety projects at present?
I’ve recently written another tutorial resource in partnership with Oxfordshire’s road safety team and this is about to come out. It’s going to look and sound very exciting.

With regard to plays, no I’m not working on anything at present – but I would be very interested to talk to anyone who has an idea, and would be delighted to be commissioned to write something.

Why do you think drama works so effectively for educational purposes?
As a teacher I know that kids have become immune to most of what they see on video and television.

Live theatre is an excellent way to effectively engage students and to get their attention. You only have to watch an audience at a show to see that this is true.

It goes without saying that the play itself must be good - the style of presentation must not ape television.

Finally, why in particular do you think your road safety work has proved so successful?
First and foremost, they were written as plays for cast and audience alike to enjoy - road safety is merely the content.

I work predominantly from real life situations so there is no call of ‘well, that couldn't have happened’. There is no argument about it – in broad terms the scenarios in my plays did happen.

The plays I am involved with are stylish and the groups that present them are highly professional - and the quality of their performances are exceptional.

I guess this is evidenced by the fact that after all these years the plays are still popular, running and effective... long may they continue to do good work!

Thanks for your time Mark – and good luck with your future work.

For more information about Mark Wheeller’s work, visit his website:
www.amdram.co.uk/wheellerplays. Alternatively he can be contacted by email at: wheellers@tiscali.co.uk

Footnote:
Here are brief details about Mark’s three road safety plays.

Too Much Punch for Judy is one of the most performed plays ever, having toured schools, colleges, prisons, army camps and the workplace, both in the UK and abroad.

It’s a hard-hitting documentary play telling the true life story of a young girl who kills her sister in a drink/drive related incident. Ten years later she went on to be responsible for another death in a road accident where she was not only drunk but had cannabis in her bloodstream.

Chicken tells the story of two cousins, Tammy and Chris. It leads the audience to believe that by the end Chris will be killed in a cycle accident because of his refusal to wear a cycle helmet. Ultimately it is Tammy who is killed in a stupid game of ‘Chicken’ on the one morning that the cousins do not cycle to school. Chris is unable to tell anyone else about his part in the accident and has to live with his dreadful secret.

Legal Weapon was commissioned by a group of ten local authorities. It tells the story of a young man whose negligence behind the wheel causes the loss of a life and the loss of his freedom. The story is fictional but uses testimony of RTA offenders and victim families.