The team at 20 Stories High is incredibly proud to have been able to see and support Co-CEO and Artistic Director Keith Saha’s contribution to My White Best Friend – North at the Liverpool Everyman in 2021. This project was based on the original concept by playwright Rachel De-Lahay and is a follow-up volume to My White Best Friend (And Other Letters Left Unsaid). 

Now published by Bloomsbury, it’s incredible to see Keith’s name among other phenomenal Global Majority writers from across the North of England in this collection of personal letters, monologues and writings. 

Speaking about the process and his experience, Keith said:

Last year I was asked by Everyman and Playhouse to write a piece for the project My White Best Friend – North. A project in which Global Majority writers wrote difficult letters to a white friend that were then read out by actors in front of an audience. Everyman asked me to write a letter to them – the building – the institution I had been part of from the age of 15, as a youth theatre member, a writer on attachment,  a professional actor, a board member and a co-producer to unpick the complex relationship.

At the time of the request we were going through a what you might call a rough patch  –  in the middle of a “Truth and Reconciliation” process in which myself and 15 other artists and ex-staff members from the Global Majority were having a dialogue with them, and exploring institutional racism within the building’s history and present culture.

The fact that they asked me to write a letter about this to be read publicly, was a definite sign that things were moving forward. On the evening, the letter was read out by Maxine Peake playing and embodying the Everyman with fragility, tenderness and gusto. It was an emotional evening. The other letters that evening were eye opening, devastating, personal and political. Now my letter to the Everyman and all the other letters are about to be published: My White Best Friend – North. A vital read. I would like to say a huge thank you to Frank Peschier and Nathan Powell for making this happen and the other amazing writers who were part of this unique happening.”

20 Stories High would like to give some appreciation to the work of the amazing people involved, as well as some artists who we have been fortunate to work with, including: Brodie Arthur, Chantelle Luñt, and Nathan Powell.

A huge congratulations to the superb writers featured in the book and beyond. 

You can buy your copy on Bloomsbury.