ADAPT: Develop your skills for the screen
ADAPT is a development programme for writers looking to adapt their work for the screen.
ADAPT focuses on the skills needed for adaptation, aiming to help prose writers and playwrights turn their original work into a new idea for Film or TV. Throughout 2024, New Writing North’s Screen Development Producer, Roxy Mckenna, is working with five Northern writers to develop their idea and get them ready to pitch it to industry.
The programme also featured a series of online talks and practical workshops exploring how writers can develop their skills in adaptation for the screen. These sessions were open to writers interested in exploring how to adapt their own play, novel or short story as well as screenwriters wishing to explore the process of adapting other peoples’ work.
Meet our ADAPT 2024 writers
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Alex Oates
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Conway McDermott
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Khatijah Balu
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Rebecca Glendenning-Laycock
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Tamsin Rees
Alex Oates
Alex Oates is a Northumberland based writer. Alex’s triple offie-nominated play Silk Road was a critical success at Edinburgh Fringe and Vault Festival before transferring for a four-week run in London’s West End -Trafalgar Studios. He’s had his work performed with Silent Uproar at Hull Truck, New Diorama, Live Theatre Newcastle, Bolton Octagon and Southwark Playhouse. He was nominated for Most Promising Playwright at The Off West End Awards for his play All in a Row. His most recent play The Filleting App has been selected out of over 2000 plays by the RSC to be part of a new folio of plays representing Britain today. Alex is adapting The Filleting App for TV.
Conway McDermot
Conway McDermott is an an award winning trans writer for stage and screen with a passion for juicy, accessible stories which ask big questions. They’re currently writing for BBC’s EastEnders, are Playwright in Residence at Box of Tricks Theatre Company, and are co-writer on Billie the Kid, a new British musical recently staged at the Vaudeville theatre. Conway and has had work commissioned by The Liverpool Everyman & Playhouse, The Theatre Royal Stratford East, and the Liverpool Light Night Festival. In 2019, they were commissioned by Popelei Theatre Company for their play The Line, which they are adapting for film.
Khatijah Balu
Khatijah Balu is an author and works in disability and employment. She lives in Blackburn, Lancashire, is an IBD warrior, and holds a Master’s in Creative Writing with English Literary Studies from Lancaster University. Her creative work is a homage to murder mystery and teenagehood, written through the lens of a South-Asian Muslim. In 2022, she won a Northern Writers’ Award for her novel in progress Lewis Didn’t Fall. Khatijah is adapting Lewis Didn’t Fall for TV.
Rebecca Glendenning-Laycock
Rebecca (she/they) is a writer, performer, and theatre maker based in Newcastle Upon Tyne. Their work is funny, and bold with a tender middle. Her debut play, We Are The Best was commissioned by Live Theatre in 2022 and she has previously had short pieces commissioned and/or staged for Freedom Studios, Workie Ticket, Curious?, Live Theatre, and Alphabetti Theatre. She was also a founding member of Queer Theatre Company Bonnie and The Bonnettes, shows included Drag Me to Love, And She, and Bonnie and Fanny’s Christmas Spectacular. Rebecca is adapting their play What’s Wrong with Betty for TV.
Tamsin Rees
Tamsin Rees (they/them) is a writer from and based in the North East of England. They are a published playwright with Bloomsbury Methuen Drama for their play Cheer Up Slug at Live Theatre which received a 4 star review from The Guardian. Tamsin was a member of the Orange Tree Writer’s Collective 21/22, and a member of the first Royal Court Writer’s Group North. They were part of the BBC North East Voices 2021, shortlisted for the top 1% for the BBC Script Room Drama 2021, and longlisted for the BBC Alfred Bradley Award 2021. Tamsin is adapting their play Stupid Girls for TV.
ADAPT workshops
In early 2024, Beth McCann ran a series of four development workshops. These practical workshops covered the nuts and bolts of adapting your work for the screen. Beth is a lecturer in Screenwriting and Script Consultant. She specialises in working with new and emerging writers. In 2008, she established Scriptwriting North, with a vision to create and support a community of screenwriters.
“Participating in the ADAPT programme has given me the sort of introduction to screenwriting which I’ve been trying to find for a very long time.”
ADAPT open-access webinars
In early 2024, we ran a series of online talks exploring how writers can develop their skills in adaptation for the screen. These sessions were open to writers interested in exploring how to adapt their own play, novel or short story as well as screenwriters wishing to explore the process of adapting other peoples’ work.
The Art of Adaptation with Alistair Owen looked at the fundamentals of screen adaptation, drawing on Alistair’s own experience writing adapted screenplays and interviewing leading practitioners.
Rebecca Lenkiewicz was in conversation about her impressive screenwriting career, with a focus on her work adapting non-fiction for the screen. Lenkiewicz is most recently known for writing the BAFTA nominated screenplay She Said, based on the non-fiction book of the same name.
Acclaimed screenwriter Hossein Amini joined us to discuss his approach to adaptation and in particular his extensive experience adapting novels for the screen. Hossein was nominated for an Oscar for his adaptation of Henry James’ classic novel Wings of a Dove, He also adapted Jude, from Thomas Hardy’s Jude the Obscure, which won the Edinburgh Film festival prize for Best British Film.
