Sitting in The Courtyard Theatre waiting to speak to Artistic Director Tim Gill I suddenly felt uncomfortable about what I was wearing.

I had planned this preliminary meeting about my first play, Running With Wolves, to the last detail - including my outfit.

It was going to involve dark colours, preferably black, with big wavy hair and dark eye make-up.

It would be a look that said 'Serious Writer'.

But the call had come mid-sunbathe in the park and my ensemble consisted of a lime green patterned top, flattened hair and baby pink lip gloss - the opposite of the effect I had hoped to achieve.

On receiving the call, I and my friend Christina Baily, acting in the play, were thrown into a state of confusion.

Instead of keeping a sufficiently professional grip on ourselves to present our proposal for a political tragedy, we were reduced to two giggling girls (not helped by the dashing good looks of Mr Gill himself as he beckoned us into his office).

It was as if we were back at school again.

Chrissie and I had both gone to Ribston Hall High School for Girls in Gloucester in the era of shell suits and TV's Gladiators.

While most of my friends were obsessed with Take That or Tom Cruise, my teen idols were Kenneth Branagh and Emma Thompson - whose performances in the film Much Ado About Nothing awakened in me a desire to act.

At the age of 14 I resolved to play the part of Beatrice and I would sit in maths lessons aping Miss Thompson - staring out of the window across the grey roofs of Gloucester, reciting reams of verse, while desperately trying to replace my Gloucester twang with her received vowels.

Shakespeare became my rebellion. My maths books were covered in sonnets, almost like a spell that would make my dreams come true.

Both Chrissie and I took A-Level drama, a course that was open to the community and held one evening a week.

This meant we had a vast number of free periods, and it was during one of these that life took an interesting turn.

We were drifting about the school corridors one day when we spied two boys from the nearby boys' school, The Crypt, in the entrance hall.

Chrissie, being the brave one, asked them what they were doing there and it turned out that they were putting on a joint school production of Grease.

The boys, who were directing and producing the show, gave themselves the main roles of Danny and Kenickie - and after a couple of strange auditions which involved draping ourselves over them while singing, I bagged the role of goofy Jan, while Chrissie was made school vamp Rizzo.

Our drama teacher tried to ban us from taking part for fear it would interfere with our studies. This turned out to be pretty accurate as it became the single most important thing about our last year at school.

The run-up to the show was dizzying; costumes were borrowed from Cheltenham's Everyman Theatre, cars were rescued from scrap yards, while musicians and dancers were sought out. It was the best experience of my life.

Afterwards we roped the boys into helping us with our drama A-level performances, in which I swapped Jan for the more refined Amanda in Noel Coward's Private Lives.

Determined not to go to university but get a proper acting training, I went to Arts Educational School of Acting (ArtsEd). Of course, it wasn't as easy as it sounds - it took four years of auditioning to get a place. I won't even try to describe how crushingly difficult that process was.

But it was worth it. Finally I was given the voice classes I had always craved - and they managed to untangle the self-taught accent I'd affected.

The indignity of standing in a leotard 'being' a giraffe and having to get up close and personal with an over-eager dance tutor ironically taught me to love physical theatre.

Meanwhile in my second year I was at last able to have a stab at my beloved Shakespeare - as one of five Desdemonas, I quickly decided it was a role I was born to play.

The highlight of my training was in my third year and came in the surprising guise of a film.

ArtsEd teaches Mike Leigh's directorial techniques and I was thrilled to be cast in a film based on his methods as I love his work.

The cast all came back from the summer break early to begin the in-depth character work.

We went all over Chiswick in character, playing out the scenes in pubs, shops and parks.

Eventually we completed a 30-minute film called Present and Correct, which was a combination of Casablanca, Dirty Dancing and The Full Monty.

A fellow student, Chris Twiselton, and I took the romantic lead roles. His character drunkenly signs himself up for an RAF charity striptease and my character, a bored forces wife, offers to teach him to dance.

The final scene was filmed at an RAF base. Despite the freezing cold I felt as if I were in Hollywood as I kissed my uniformed co-star under a floodlit plane.

After filming I was brought back down to earth with a bump, heading off to my evening job as an usher at the Albery Theatre in the West End. There's nothing like cleaning ashtrays with a plastic glove and bucket to keep you grounded.

I had worked there throughout my training; doing both was exhausting but it was a privilege to be able to study great actors at work.

I had thought it would be the perfect place to network with directors but unfortunately the only friends I made were other ushers. The furthest I got with my networking ambitions was a fleeting dance with Sir Cameron Mackintosh - at a press night party.

After finishing the course with my showcase, teaming up once again with Chris to perform a piece from Arthur Smith's Live Bed Show, I decided I would create my own career opportunities.

I was affected by a documentary I happened to see about the Chechen female suicide bombers and I decided to write a play about it.

I've always written songs, poetry and sketches but it was writing a diary that helped me most to transfer thoughts and feelings onto to the page to create what would become Running With Wolves.

It took about a year to complete the first draft, but I then found I had absolutely no idea what to do with it. A friend hosted a reading and from there I was able to find a director in Steve Hubbard.

Steve's enthusiasm about the script was simply amazing. When we first met to discuss it he seemed to know it better than I did. A collaborative process began, involving re-writes and workshopping with actors. Steve and I frequently sat up late after rehearsals with a bottle (or few) of cheap red wine, talking at length about scenes and our beliefs about theatre. Looking back, this was the best part of the whole process as I had discovered one aspect of being a writer is loneliness: after making a breakthrough after weeks of struggling there's no-one to tell but yourself. The fact that Steve is also a very talented writer also was a great help.

As for the handsome Mr Gill, after our successful meeting, he generously offered The Courtyard, near Old Street, to host a staged reading. After feedback and more re-writes it was finally performed at Trafalgar Studios (2) in the West End for one night. This opportunity came after an usher friend heard they had some free dates and asked if we could put forward our proposal.

We were donated some money which paid for the little bit of set and few costumes we needed but most things - rehearsal space, performance space, artists, technicians - were all free, proving that lack of finances can be got around.

In the meantime I was still acting in theatre, film and in Abandon Theatre's Comedy Improvisation show Your Line or Mine, which went Edinburgh Fringe twice.

Working with a new theatre company has taught me a lot about production and also given me the chance to develop my performance skills. I am now working with the group on their sketch show and they are developing my next play The Other Day.

I'm very excited about what the future holds for both my acting and my writing. My enthusiasm was summed up by a quote I saw on a whiteboard at Clapham North station, on the way to a production meeting a couple of weeks ago.

It said: 'A bird doesn't sing because it has answers, it sings because it has a song.'

Well, I've got songs, and I'm going to sing them.

END

(c) Chloe Austin 15 February 2008

Sub-editor - Bo Wilson

Fringe Report (c) Fringe Report 2002-2008