Jack Shepherd Revival Sets First Chasing the Moment Run Without Him
jack shepherd created Chasing the Moment, acted in it and played piano in it, and the Arcola is now planning a revival of the play in the near future. For the first time, the production will go ahead without the man who shaped it from the inside.
Arcola stages Shepherd’s play
The revival matters because Shepherd was not just the writer behind Chasing the Moment; he was part of the performance itself. The play brings jazz players into a pub basement one at a time before they play a gig during the interval, a structure that tied his writing, acting and musical instincts together.
That mix is why this revival is more than a routine return to repertoire. The Arcola is mounting a new staging of a work that depended on Shepherd’s presence, and this version will test whether the piece holds its shape without the creator who performed it.
1993 to November
Shepherd’s wider theatre record makes the revival feel like a continuation, not a museum piece. He directed In Lambeth at the Donmar Warehouse in 1989, was asked to come on board when Southwark Playhouse in London was set up in 1993, and directed King Lear at the Southwark in 1996.
In 1996, he told actors on King Lear: “I don’t know. It’s your character. Figure it out and just do it. I’ll tell you when it’s wrong.” That line captures the kind of maker he was: hands-off until the work needed correction, and intensely practical when it did.
After Shepherd’s death
Shepherd died in November, which turns this revival into a posthumous staging rather than a simple restatement of his work. The first time a play crosses that line is always the one that tells the clearest story about whether the writing can stand apart from the writer.
For audiences, the practical answer is straightforward: Chasing the Moment is coming back at the Arcola, but not in the form Shepherd once performed. That is the point of the event and the pressure on it at the same time.
