In Their Own Words
"The brief with Talking to Terrorists which is why it's such a difficult play was a much broader one, it was sort of what makes people, especially young people, which was something Max [Stafford-Clarke] kept going on about, why is it that especially young people get involved in acts of violence? What is it that turns perfectly well balanced woman into a person who commits acts of violence? And, are there any other aspects of the problem that are worth exploring? [So it was] really as loose as that really, so really just a play about the nature of terrorism, what makes people do it, and so where do you start? You start by meeting some terrorists."
Robin Soans, writer
"[My verbatim rule is that] every single thing should have been said by somebody, the bricks you build your house on should have been said by somebody, and I'm not a purist, [...] if I want something very direct and moving I might not clutter it with a lot of repetitions or, that's up to me and I'm not in any way going to say I'm a purist. There are some forms of verbatim theatre where you absolutely take every single syllable just as they are said and don't tamper with them or edit them - just let it go as a stream of consciousness which is in one way very entertaining but that's about all it is. You can't get very far with it because if you are going to make an evening's theatre, you really have got to sculpt this into something as near a play as possible. And that's something that I think I've been reasonably successful at, because people say it didn't seem like verbatim theatre, it seemed something very like a play."
Robin Soans, writer
"The best thing you can say [about the play] is they are voices that haven't really been heard before, and that's the whole point. You're talking about excluded voices suddenly getting a platform, but that's the value of the exercise. It's not the be all and end all answer for tackling the issues. But I thought... Yeah, I was really happy to be included in it."
Pat Magee, peace campaigner and former IRA member
"I realised [an early] hole in the play, because the terrorists appeared very charismatic and almost heroic and I saw immediately that we needed a corrective to that. Because, however inevitable their actions in the first place given the circumstances of the time, we still had to remember that innocent people['s] [...] lives were changed forever in a really appalling way and that that was something that needed to be addressed."
Robin Soans, writer
"[At the beginning and end of interviews] you learn about somebody, not in the narrow confines of their intellectual prowess if you like, but you learn about them as a human being in their vulnerable state. They're not vulnerable when they're talking to you politically, they're in fact probably at their least vulnerable because they're in an area where they are safe. They're talking about something they know about or something they feel confident about, but when they are in [the beginning and end of the interview] they're probably talking about - well they're not guarded in a way, they're not guarding themselves against [anything]."
Robin Soans, writer
"[It] is a very political play in that it deliberately does strive to initiate a debate, you know more than any play I can think of that comes to mind. It was set up with that purpose. [...] But I felt a wee bit cheated I suppose, because the writer who came over came to interview me with the guy who was going to play me - he asked a few questions off the mark and then, okay he put this away and kept asking the questions. And funnily enough a lot of the stuff that he included, a lot of the dialog in the script came from off the cuff remarks. [...] I think he wanted the human touch, and I suppose I did come across a little round - you do loosen up a wee bit. And fine, I could live with anything he's included, but - how do you put it - given the opportunity to try and say something, to convey something, I would have put more in."
Pat Magee, peace campaigner and former IRA member
