Pinchbeck, M., 2023.

Leaving a space to listen: working with John Berger on Another Way of Telling

In Spring 2021, during lockdown, I made contact with John Christie, film-maker and director of the TV documentary Another Way of Telling, screened on BBC in 1988. I asked him about how his work on the film had come about and the process of collaborating with John Berger and Jean Mohr. My interests in this subject were inspired by my own theatre practice of adapting Berger and Mohr's book for the stage. Following A Fortunate Man (2018) and A Seventh Man (2020), I was now in the process of making the final piece in The Berger & Mohr Trilogy based on Another Way of Telling - the book that was published in 1982 and the subject of John Christie's film. The following is the transcript of our conversation which took place via Zoom. Before the conversation took place John had sent me a copy of his film on DVD which I watched before we met.