The original production was performed by the Fulcrum Players and directed by Nancy Ruthven. It toured community venues and schools in both inner city areas such as Toxteth, Brixton, St. Pauls, Bristol and Chapel Town, Leeds, and urban areas with little first-hand experience of racial tensions.
Betty Gray is a member of the Newcastle Community Relations Council and of the Tyneside Committee for Racial Harmony, and a former teacher: ‘I have a deep commitment to making our multi-racial society really work. In writing Clashpoint I wanted to offer an idea that could heal the bitterness of the divisions of class and race which so affect the life of our country. The plot is based on my own experiences of such an idea. Nothing changes at a deep enough level unless there is a change in our own human nature. Moral Re-Armament, with its guidelines of absolute honesty, purity, unselfishness and love, and its emphasis on the truth that God will show us what to do if we listen to Him, shows people the way to experience that kind of change, and to relate it to the needs around them. Then the whole dimension of change - personal, social, national and international - becomes a real possibility.'
Nancy Ruthven is a director, actress and playwright. She is the author of four musicals, nine plays and several adaptations.
English