You’re six years old. Mum’s in hospital. Dad says she’s “done something stupid.” She finds it hard to be happy. So you start to make a list of everything that’s brilliant about the world. Everything that’s worth living for.
1. Ice cream.
2. Kung Fu movies.
3. Burning things.
4. Laughing so hard you shoot milk out your nose.
5. Construction cranes.
6. Me.
You leave it on her pillow.
You know she’s read it because she’s corrected your spelling. Soon, the list will take on a life of its own.
Every Brilliant Thing was first produced by Paines Plough and Pentabus Theatre on 28 June 2013 at Ludlow Fringe Festival.
Duncan Macmillan is an award-winning writer and director. Plays include: Lungs (Paines Plough/Sheffield Crucible and Studio Theatre Washington D.C.), Platform (Old Vic Tunnels), Monster (Royal Exchange/Manchester International Festival), The Most Humane Way to Kill A Lobster (Theatre 503), I Wish To Apologise For My Part In The Apocalypse , So Say All of Us and Family Tree (all BBC Radio 4). Formerly Writer-in-Residence at Paines Plough and the Royal Exchange, he has completed attachments at the National Theatre and the Royal Court/BBC, is a member of the Old Vic New Voices Company and a fellow of the TS Eliot UK/US Exchange. He is the winner of two Bruntwood Playwriting Awards, the Old Vic Big Ambition Award, a Pearson Residency Award, 'The 50' Bursary, and has been nominated in the Best New Play category of the TMA and MEN Awards.