Theatre made a big impression on James Ley, growing up in Edinburgh. His parents, keen on amateur dramatics, often took him to performances. “I remember going to Brecht’s Mother Courage And Her Children when I was about 12 at the Royal Lyceum. That had a big impression on me.” At around the same age, he caught a Derek Jarman film late one night on the BBC. “That was one of my first queer experiences,” he says. “Jarman was so unapologetically telling queer stories.”
As a teenager, Ley acted with Scottish Youth Theatre and earned an acting degree at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. He concentrated on writing after graduation.
Now based in Glasgow, Ley is charting a path from award-winning playwright to in-demand screenwriter. He has adapted two of his plays for features, both with development funding from Screen Scotland. Love Song To Lavender Menace is with John McKay and Laura McBride’s Compact Pictures, with Savvas Stavrou set to direct. Ley describes it as “an anarchic queer-history story crossed with romantic comedy”.
He also hopes to make his feature directorial debut with his adaptation of Fringe First 2023 winner Ode To Joy (How Gordon Got To Go To The Nasty Pig Party). Ley says that comedy drama is more “provocative and out there — it feels more like the place I’m at now with the work I’m developing”.
He has already proven that provocative directorial voice in queer fantasy Sleazy Tiger, a short film starring Alan Cumming as a wilder, cake-sitting version of himself that made waves at festivals including Palm Springs and Edinburgh, and was nominated for Best of British at the Iris Prize. His next short Bed To The Future already has funding.
Ley’s theatre slate is also busy with commissions, including for the Royal Lyceum, National Theatre Studio and Cumming’s Pitlochry Festival Theatre. “I’m ambitious for theatre as an art form,” says Ley. “I’m excited to do more screen work, and I’m doing something a bit different than in theatre. I don’t want to just write screenplays that have very long scenes with loads of talking. For both theatre and films, I’m just trying to make them alive.”
Ley hopes to continue exploring queerness in his work. “The queer identity of Scotland is fascinating,” he says. “Lavender Menace started with a queer history, and then Ode To Joy is about Scottish identity now, and how that fits with Scottish independence and self-determination.”
Contact: Kelly Knatchbull, Sayle Screen
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