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Over a few short weeks in March I went from planning the next moves for my new play to questioning whether the theatre world as we know it will even continue to exist. This quantum shift has of course affected all those working in the creative industries, making the creative act itself hard to sustain.

UK theatre – while leading the world in the quality of output – is uniquely vulnerable to this public health crisis, and there is simply no way for our industry to survive without major, sustained government support – at all levels of our theatrical ecosystem.

Venues I’ve worked with such as the Arcola and Theatre503 are now facing the catastrophic impact of prolonged closure. These theatres are vital to the development of new work and talent, and they survive on shoestring budgets. Without a functioning network of local, fringe and small-scale venues, the entire ecosystem will wither away.

Sadly it all comes down to money. We don’t need platitudes, roadmaps or good intentions. We need investment. Theatres can’t sit tight and wait for the storm to blow over. They need help now.

Ours is an industry fuelled by passion, but we still have to keep roofs over our heads. While those at the visible pinnacle of our industry may be in some cases richly rewarded, the normal condition for those working in our industry is a variable and insufficient income, which simply cannot withstand long-term interruption.

Some writers have been inspired by lockdown to develop engaging, form-bending new work. I’m not one of them. At a time when an imaginative release would be most welcome, the mundane anxieties of survival get in the way. Still, a crisis like this helps to provide much-needed perspective, and better days will return in time.

For now I’m trying to work on some shorter writing projects, and plan for those better days. In the meantime, check out my blink-and-you’ll-miss-it contribution to the Royal Court’s fabulous Court At Home project, inspired by my favourite Royal Court play of recent years, Lucy Kirkwood’s The Children.

Three plays made a special connection with me this year: The Wild Duck at the Almeida, Girls & Boys at the Royal Court, and the Young Vic’s West End production of The Inheritance (I missed the original run).

Robert Icke’s radical adaptation of Ibsen’s The Wild Duck proved once again his alchemic ability to conjure drama out of thin air. What begins as an arm’s-length study of the source text becomes a powerfully engrossing, and significantly unresolved, battle between two opposing philosophies: truth at all costs and the ‘life lie’.

Equally breathtaking was Denis Kelly’s Girls & Boys. Driven by Carey Mulligan’s charmingly brutal, deeply multifaceted performance, this play about the fallout of thwarted masculinity draws you in to rip you apart. You quickly sense the dark place it’s taking you to but you can’t turn away.

From a cast of one to a consummate ensemble, Matthew Lopez’s The Inheritance is an expansive, touching study of a generation of gay New Yorkers living in the long shadow of the AIDS crisis. The play glides effortlessly from the personal to the political throughout its two impressively self-contained parts.

Inspired by EM Forster’s Howard’s End, The Inheritance curiously shares with Icke’s The Wild Duck a manner of making up the show from scratch and subjecting it to continued scrutiny, along with a critical attitude towards its originator. Just as Ibsen’s motives in creating The Wild Duck are called into question, so Forster is challenged for suppressing his own sexuality. In both cases the metatextual moves are elegant rather than showy, and deepen our understanding.

I must also mention Arinzé Kene’s Misty and debbie tucker green’s ear for eye, two more plays to round out my top five of the year.

Kene’s lyrical triumph is a provoking exploration of what it means to be ‘a black play’ that never forgets to entertain, as well as enlighten, its audience. Meanwhile the hotly anticipated ear for eye delivered a poetic, scathing account of the many layers of prejudice suffered by black Britons and Americans.

Speaking of which, my final highlight of the year was Fabia Turner’s smart and insightful review of this important play. Read Fabia Turner’s review of ear for eye here.