It may be a global village but can three actors make all the world a stage? Chris Thorpe tells TAMZIN LEWIS about the thought-provoking new show What I Heard About The World

WHILE working for a Sunday tabloid I recall being asked to rip weird and wonderful stories out of magazines such as The National Enquirer and rewrite them as amusing short stories. It was probably journalism in one of its lowest forms but quite harmless, despite the lack of ‘facts’.

I’m reminded of this peculiar task while talking to writer and actor Chris Thorpe who appears in What I Heard About The World at Northern Stage tonight.

The show is about stories from across the world which may sound absurd but, in this instance, have been checked for authenticity.

Chris says: “The story that started it off was hearing about the US military’s Flat Daddies scheme. When a soldier gets posted overseas, the military give the family the option of getting a life-sized cardboard cut-out of the serviceman or woman in uniform.

“You can see videos of people taking them to parties, the shopping mall or church. The Flat Daddy can become such an effective stand-in that when the actual parent comes home, the younger kids don’t want to talk to the real parent.”

Chris began to make What I Heard About The World two years ago in a collaboration with Sheffield-based Third Angel and Portuguese theatre company mala voadora.