We sat down with playwright, Sabrina Mahfouz, to chat about her play Argos Archives which opens at Omnibus on 25th Februry. Argos Archives is a nostalgic celebration of neuro-divergent self-discovery.
Argos is such a specific and nostalgic obsession—what is it about the store and its legendary catalogue that made you want to build a whole play around it?
Argos Archives was written in collaboration with and in direct response to workshops that Futures Theatre held with Thrive Creatives, a facilitated group of young women on the autism spectrum. Everyone shared stories from their life, as well as imaginings for their future. From this, the story of a Woman on the autism spectrum who wants to be an archivist and decides that, as she’s unable to access this career through the current mainstream pathways, she’ll create her own pathway and the first step will be to get a job at Argos. The story isn’t one person’s, but an amalgamation of fiction and memories from all those who worked on it and from the collective memory of all those who have had Argos in their lives in one way or another. Like you say, it’s such a nostalgic national obsession, it shouldn’t have been a surprise that everyone had such distinct memories associated with Argos, but I was taken with how many shared emotions could be found using Argos as a starting point.
The play explores neurodivergent self-discovery in a way that’s both deeply personal and universal. Was there a particular moment or experience that sparked the idea for Argos Archives?
This was a natural progression due to the facilitated group, Thrive Creatives, all having experience of neurodivergence. It wasn’t the focus of the work, but it’s fundamental to it because it is fundamental to the people who created it.
You’ve worked across poetry, theatre, and TV—how does your approach to storytelling shift between these different mediums, and did any of them influence how you shaped this play?
My approach used to be quite similar across mediums – find a question I wanted to ask, think of a world that would be interesting to address that question from and a character in that world that I was drawn to writing. But now, after learning more about the craft specific to each of them, for better or worse, I do tend to approach each one in a distinct way. Each project also requires its own approach, so there’s no set of rules I follow when embarking on a new project. With this play, it was an amalgamation of collaboration and each stage of creation was led by that.
The play features Argos as a mythical Grecian giant. How did that character come to life, and what does it represent in the story?
Argos is a city in Greece that is the oldest continuously inhabited city in Europe. Some say that city is named after the Ancient Greek giant with 100 eyes, Argus, or Argos. It felt too good to not use, especially as we have a main character who must vigilantly keep watching the world around her to understand how she can fit into it. Our Argos is a personified part of our Woman, who is occasionally drawn to releasing their inner ancient monster!
With creative captioning and projection-based design, Argos Archives is built to be a neurodivergent-friendly experience. How did you and the creative team navigate blending accessibility with artistic storytelling?
Neurodivergence is obviously hugely diverse, so there’s nothing that can be incorporated into a production to make sure it is created with every need in mind. What I think it means in this instance is that the different languages of the play – text, speech, song, music, images, music, movement – have been calibrated to allow an enjoyment of the story in whichever way storytelling speaks to you. Due to the collaborative nature and the centrality of this idea to the director Caroline Bryant, this blending of accessibility with artistic storytelling felt very organic and inevitable.
What do you hope audiences take away from this character’s journey?
I hope audiences feel some aspects of their own frustrations and ambitions reflected back at them, even if they’ve lived very different lives to the one our character has. But mostly I hope they enjoy hanging out with this unique woman who has innovated at every step to be able to find joy and fulfilment in aspects of her life that so many take for granted.
Argos runs from 25th Feb to 15th March at Omnibus Theatres