Prior to writing ‘Touch Blue Touch Yellow’, my main focus was mostly on comic writing. On many of these comedies, I worked extensively with another writer Peter Jones.
Dead Man’s Fall
written by Tim Rhys, devised by Tim Rhys & Peter Jones
“Fine, fiercely black comedy… True comic invention. Comic timing as sharp as any scissors move at the Arms Park.”
(The Guardian)
“As good a comedy as you can get… Hilarious. Soap on steroids. See it.”
(Bristol Evening Post)
“Flamboyant surrealism… A riotous farce that makes for a brilliant evening’s entertainment.” (South Wales Echo)
The Ghost of Morgan Morris
written by Tim Rhys, devised by Tim Rhys & Peter Jones
“An inventive, hilarious and impeccably paced work. It surprises throughout, though it probably doesn’t bear thinking about how some of the ideas were conceived… A work of inspired madness: gross, witty and performed wonderfully, it is a real delight.”
(Hampstead & Highgate Gazette)
“Lurid, funny and sad. It has an appealing, surreal quality.” (The Independent)
Ted’s Creatures
by Tim Rhys and Peter Jones
“Ted is an hilarious, archetypal monster.” (The Guardian)
The Cull
“Having been a small sheep farmer affected by these issues I would like to offer the greatest praise for this play. It is an unbelievably accurate record of the issues that arose and were discussed at the time as I saw it. I believe it should be kept as an important record of social history for the future. I sincerely hope it will be repeated soon so that I may recommend it to others.” (M. Rippin, Abergavenny )
Television / Film
Half Life (HTV and Wales Screen Council) – Winner, Best UK Short Film, Manchester International Festival of Fantastic Films, 2004
Belonging, co-storyliner for 1st series of BBC Wales drama serial
The Noble Guide to Hiraeth, comedy sketches for BBC Wales series.
Theatre
‘Joyrider’, commissioned by Volcano Theatre Co. Set in Swansea, a theatrical exploration of a teenage craze of stealing cars for dangerous ‘joyride’ stunts. Performed in Volcano’s uniquely explosive style.
‘Dead Man’s Fall’, written by Tim Rhys, co-devised with Peter Jones. Directed by Simon Davies. Wayne’s respectable life has crashed, his job and his wife gone, his belongings & furniture taken by bailiffs. In need of company, he invites old boyhood friend Eifion, an inspired but drug-fuelled anarchist, to move into his soon-to-be repossessed house. Together they plot a crime that will shock & appal the Welsh public but might solve their money troubles. Premiered at Hen and Chicken, Bristol and Bath Theatre Royal, Ustinov Studio, then toured Wales.
‘The Ghost Of Morgan Morris’, Old Red Lion, Angel, London & toured South Wales. A bitter ex-rugby superstar, desperate to resurrect his lost fame, discovers that he’s a poetic genius, and embarks on a high-stakes, new career. written by Tim Rhys, co-devised with Peter Jones. .
A Big Black Hole, a tragi-comic solo play, commissioned by Theatr-y-Byd; a struggling actor builds himself up for a long-awaited audition (toured Wales).
‘Dai Cardiff’s Galaxy of Stars’, Chapter Arts Centre. A live comedy in the form of a surreal variety show.
‘The Old Petrol Station’, Sherman Theatre Company (part of ‘A Generation Arises’, pub. in ‘Act One Wales’, Seren). A young driver runs out of petrol in the middle of the night near a lonely petrol station in the wilds of Mid Wales. It turns out to be a ‘heritage’ petrol station, a strange theme park experience, where nothing works or is as it seems.
‘Ted’s Creatures’, written by Tim Rhys and Peter Jones, commissioned & produced by Made In Wales Stage Company. Ted, a lonely, paranoid man, has had his fabulous encounters with God silenced by anti-psychotics. Turfed out of his mental hospital, he now believes he has been abandoned by the Lord. But one dark night, contemplating suicide in a railway station café, he is recruited by a zealous evangelist from a radical ‘born-again’ church. Fired up with his new-found fervour, Ted embarks on his dangerous, holy mission.
‘Jacko Davies, The God Of Racing Pigeons’,
The Garw Valley Community Play, Blaengarw Workmen’s Hall.
‘Under Three Crosses’, a community play for Three Crosses, Gower.
‘The Cwmblast Heritage Experience’, Cynon Valley Youth Theatre, Aberdare Coliseum
Radio
The Cull, BBC Radio Wales. A sixty-minute radio play on the crisis in rural Welsh farming communities
The Member For Penbanog , a satirical comedy set in the National Assembly for Wales. Recorded live at the Sherman Theatre for BBC Radio Wales.
Station Road , BBC Radio Wales drama serial – regular series writer.
Riding With Buffalo Bill, BBC Radio 4. In 1903, Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show came to Swansea. In a museum, a young man finds a head-dress from that visit and swaps places with the reservation-dwelling Lakota warrior who’d originally worn it.
Dai Cardiff – Renaissance Man, comedy, BBC Radio 4 . A one-off comedy about an unprincipled, hapless talent agent, plying his acts around the South Wales valleys.
The Last Visible Dog, devised by Tim Rhys and Peter Jones, written by Tim Rhys. A six-part comedy drama serial, BBC Radio Wales.
Internet
As the British Council’s first Internet Writer-in-Residence, I wrote Crazy World, an interactive, multi-media serial on British Council’s LearnEnglish website. Crazy World took the form of a news magazine, with stories from its chaotic, futuristic setting in a half-drowned London, littered with malfunctioning robots. It was re-published in print by ELL, an English language magazine, in China.