When Andy Roberts was five, he and his nine-year-old brother snuck downstairs while their parents were asleep to video a movie which would change their world.
The film was the classic Arnold Schwarzenegger-starring jungle-set mash-up of gun-toting action and horror science-fiction: Predator.
The brothers proceeded to recreate the film in their shared bedroom for the next year.
“Literally every day we would get back from school, put the VHS tape on and watch the next scene,” says Roberts. “We would look at what was happening, grab everything we could from the house and recreate it. We were quite young so we had that freedom where we could change things, so as our version went along the more artistic licence we took.”
Sadly Roberts’ brother began to find other interests – mainly football and girls – and allied to a house move which meant the brothers got separate rooms, and the game stopped abruptly.
“I was devastated we never kept the play going,” remembers Roberts.
“Throughout the whole of my life and career I have thought about it – every time I see a cardboard box I think, ‘We could have made a good trap out of that.”
With his new show Predator, Roberts has started the game going again.
The inspiration for the return to his childhood games came from a 2010 Edinburgh Fringe showbyBootwerksTheatre’s co-artistic director James Baker.
“He did a performance called 30 Days To Space,” says Roberts. “He climbed a ladder 1,406 times a day for 30 days until he reached the height where space starts.
“At the end he sent a letter to NASA asking if he could be an honorary astronaut.”
The show, for which Roberts was Ground Control, was inspired by the fact Baker had become too old to train as an astronaut, so that particular childhood ambition appeared to have gone forever.
“He wanted to make it any way he could,” says Roberts. “I started thinking aboutmydreams as a kid. I couldn’t think of a job I wanted to do but I remembered I’d never finished recreating this film.”
Integral to the show is Roberts’ play with three volunteers from the audience.
“What inspired me most was that it couldn’t be done alone,” he says. “First of all I wanted to do it as a piece for just me and three participants, with no outside audience. I wanted it to be a small moment we shared between us.
“I did a scratch night at The Basement which had an outside audience and they absolutely adored it. It is still all about playing with three people, but the audience can watch us creating this film as it happens.”
The advantage of this showfor Roberts is now he is able to take the lead.
“When kids are playing it is always the older sibling who gets to be the director and hero,” says Roberts. “The youngest always has to play every other character.”
The show has a definite structure to keep itonthe rails – even including sections of narrative between Roberts and his now grown-up brother – but what happens onstage changes from night to night.
“In rehearsals we had moments that could go on for ten minutes because people were getting really into it, and then other times it would last for two minutes,” says Roberts. “We need to keep following the story, but it is different every time.”
duncan.hall@theargus.com
The Basement, Kensington Street, Brighton, Thursday, May 17, and Friday, May 18, 7pm, £8, 01273 709709
Predator is part of East By South-East at The Basement, which also features performances of Made In China’s We Hope That You’re Happy (Why Would We Lie?) on Thursday and Sylvia Rimat’s I Guess If The Stage Exploded on Friday, both from 8.30pm. Tickets for each show cost £8, or £14 for two.
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