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![Julia Pascal Julia Pascal](https://writersguild.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/JULIA-LAUGHING-LOW-RES-400x427.jpg)
In my 30s when I was working as a theatre director, I was writing a great deal of journalism and it hit me that I should transfer my skills to drama. My stage writing grew from my work as an actor, director and journalist. The deadlines around print journalism gave a sense of discipline. Becoming a writer suited my curious nature and my profound interest in human behaviour. I made a living out of journalism for some time but stage writing is a rocky road.
Martha Gellhorn for her chutzpah, her irony, her bravado and Hannah Arendt. I am dramatising a forgotten moment in Arendt’s life at the moment and feel particularly close to her. As for Gellhorn, I knew her when she was at the end of her life. She was writing to the end.
In 1984 I wrote a play called Far Above Rubies, which was produced at the Drill Hall. My first published play was Theresa in 2000. it appeared in a collection by Faber and in the volume The Holocaust Trilogy published by Oberon Books.
Crossing Jerusalem set in the 2002 intifada. I forced myself to write a play set within 24 hours. This was a new journey for me. I was pleased to write a huge political play that reflected the voices of both sides and left the arguments open. The first production was a commission at the Tricycle Theatre directed by Jack Gold. I directed the second production in 2015 at the Park Theatre.
The people I hear in buses, in the street, the memories people tell me about a relative, the refugees I meet through those who help them.
I watch films and television series to explore other writers’ techniques. I can’t switch off.
Write all the time and revise in 10 years.
Networking, connections, stimulation.
I trained as an actor, worked in theatre, television and film before directing at the National Theatre on the South Bank where I was the first woman to do so. This was for Men Seldom Make Passes, my adaptation of Dorothy Parker’s writings which ran for two years as a Platform Performance. My plays are published by Oberon Books and they have been produced in the UK, Europe and the USA. I have written for radio. I studied film writing in order to expand my skills and am now writing screenplays as well as new stage texts.