Brad Birch’s new play delves right into the social politics of contemporary society, teasing out the progressively heavier pressures of consumerism, of finding balance, battling with time and battling with each other. Recently in attachment at the Royal Court, a graduate of the theatre’s Young Writers Programme and Supergroup, former Resident Writer at Theatre 503 and a student of politics, philosophy and economics, Birch’s work concerns itself unsurprisingly with the problems and politics of contemporary life.

This is the young Welsh playwright’s first production at the Soho Theatre. Even Stillness Breathes Softly Against a Brick Wall is Birch’s collaboration with director Nadia Latif, former Associate Director of Theatre 503, and actors Joe Dempsie (Game of Thrones, Skins) and Lara Rossi (13 and Emperor and Galilean at the National, Women, Power and Politics at the Tricycle).  We’re presented with two people who cease to hold the weight of a society that demands more of them than they can possible cope with.Below we find out Birch’s interest in consumerism and the culture of excess, why the playtext is blueprint and why he’s interested in the everyday.

Diana Damian: Let’s start with your poetic title, Even Stillness Breathes Softly Against a Brick Wall. It’s a constructed image as well as an inferred action, and there’s some clear suggestions there of containment too. Can you tell us about that?

Brad Birch: In some ways the title came out of the fact that more people are going to read it than see the play itself, so it’s an attempt to create a bit of poetry or imagery even if it’s just someone glancing through the listings. And I suppose the title is a pointer to the overarching feeling of the play. It’s expressive and heightened because that’s what the play tries to do – it uses extraordinary ways to discuss or look at the very ordinary things.

Diana Damian: Two people are at the centre of this conflict that considers the excess of contemporary life. Tell us a bit about what compelled you to write the play, what informed your process and the style of the piece.

Brad Birch: I’m fascinated by the subtle (and not so subtle) oppressions and suppressions we find ourselves experiencing every day. From being pressured by appointments, emails that require instant responses, ringing telephones right through to traffic congestion and what have you. The play does look at the excesses of contemporary life but I don’t entirely hate consumerism. I can’t do because I accept many aspects of it and these aspects are a part of my life. I suppose I mean there’s a level of acceptance and my level of acceptance is a £1.49 double cheeseburger from McDonald’s. Which is a pretty low threshold. But even if I accept it I can still worry about it. I worry about it all the time. But my worry doesn’t come from a detached righteousness. It comes from guilt because there are many aspects of consumerism that I embrace. I think that’s necessary. A piece of work exploring consumerism that doesn’t articulate the pure joy of a Kinder Surprise is missing a little bit of something – that thing that draws us all in in the first place.

Diana Damian: Can you introduce the characters to us?

Brad Birch: Fundamentally they are two very ordinary people who have their coping mechanisms tested by the continuing drags of life. I wanted them to represent the everyday person in many respects. I don’t mean that they’d be two-dimensional (I hope), but that they’re relatable. I hope that they come across like a couple we all know. Professional, university graduates, shops at Ikea, living on the outskirts of town, he plays 5 a side and she reads the in-vogue lifestyle magazines. And I suppose they did begin as people I know. Templates come from all sorts of people. But the moment you start to play with them as characters – messing with their make-up – then they become something else. But I think it’s important they retain a very real everydayness about them.

Diana Damian: Part of what the play explores has to do with negotiating wanting and needing, as well as collapse. What is this contemporary world you’re examining through the lens of these two characters?

Brad Birch: I wonder where addiction fits into the want/need paradigm. And the empty attempts at fulfilment by passively consuming rather than fulfilment by being active and pursuing certain things. There’s nothing particularly active about consuming, is there? It’s just collecting. I don’t know. I think there’s an inherent flaw in the construction of our culture. The new economy has given us so many things but there are aspects that sometimes feel built on sand. This play I suppose is about the point when the sand slips and how vulnerable we could actually be.

Diana Damian: Can you tell us a bit about the development process of the play, and your collaboration with actors Joe Dempsie and Lara Rossi, and director Nadia Latif?

Brad Birch: The play’s had a tremendously long development and while it’s not the first play I’ve had on, it was one of the first plays I wrote. So in this sense it’s a bit of a year zero for me. Nadia picked it up about a year and a half ago and it’s been a long but rewarding journey getting it to this place. Lara and Joe are doing fantastically and it’s hard to imagine the play without them as the characters now. The entire team have been incredibly generous, bringing so much to the table.

Diana Damian: Does this play draw from any of your previous work? I’m thinking of plays with equally evocative titles, such as The Sound of Every Car Crashing at Once performed at Theatre 503 last year, or Billy Chickens is a Psychopath Superstar at Latitude? You seem to think of play titles are containing the essential action of that piece, would you agree with that?

Brad Birch: I think all plays affect each other and the more you write the more you have behind you, affecting you. A culmination, maybe. In terms of titles, I suppose they can often give a bit of a glimpse into the play. Though I don’t know if I’ll stick with long titles for every play. Saying that, the next thing I’m doing – a one man show going up to Edinburgh with Undeb Theatre – does again have a long title – Gardening: for the Unfulfilled and Alienated – so maybe it’s one of those concerns that I have but I refuse to do a thing about. I have a lot of them.

Diana Damian: How do you work with directors, and how do you deal approach authorship of your work?

Brad Birch: Well the director is the person you interact with the most, so it’s important to ensure you’re working with directors you get on with and are generally on the same page with. But likewise with everyone involved in a production. The playtext isn’t the finished article. It’s a blueprint for the art, not the art itself. It needs to be directed, it needs to be acted, it needs to be designed, lit etc etc etc. So that always needs consideration. Theatre is a collaborative art.

Diana Damian: Where do you see your work fit in the current landscape of new writing, having had a training and working relationship with theatres such as The Royal Court and Theatre 503? How do feel the field is changing?

Brad Birch: I don’t know how my work fits in the current landscape. But that’s a good thing, I think. I’d hate to sit here knowing exactly what slot my work goes in. I think the field always needs to keep changing. Open Court is very exciting and I’m chuffed to be involved in it. Theatres need to keep moving and that’s what I like about the Court. It’s such a dynamic place. There’s always a new person in the building every time I go there. Likewise with 503. There’s a nice balance between a core team and a community of people working in and with the theatre. And these institutions are no more than the sum of the people that make them and any success they have is entirely down to the people making the work.