A sense of place and the character of the architecture is central to the play.The idea that the world and its built environment functions like the internal digestion system of the human being recurs throughout. Charlie the agrieved Sewerman is psychotically dedicated to building his GUTS MACHINE which is both his instrument of purging destruction and his symbol of universal harmony. Charlie is a good egg driven a bit phantom of the opera by the death of his wife and his hatred of the semi criminal property developer Carlisle.
As the two come into conflict the subterranean GUTS MACHINE seems to conjure up the ghosts of similar antagonists John Dobson and Richard Grainger, architect and master builder of Newcastle's Nineteenth Century city centre.
With this in mind, Peter, Fiona and I began visiting some potential sites for staging the play, with a view that the location would become like another character in the play.
We began with my personal favourite. I am usually preoccupied by extremes and it is the subterranean, stigean underworld of the sewers and Charlies steampunk, anatomical GUTS MACHINE and it's opposite loft/penthouse roof of the city looking down world of Carlisle that excites me most.
What could be more central to newcastle than the Tyne Bridge?
We visted the North Tower and we kindly showed around by our helpful guide Lee.
Here are some pictures from the visit.
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