‘Don’t get too close in to him,” Gaynor Faye tells an actor as she directs rehearsals of The Syndicate, a stage adaptation of Kay Mellor’s TV series about lottery winners. “This is theatre, so open up the space.” We’re in a rehearsal room at Leeds Grand theatre, and the table where Faye sits – ringbound script, pencils, reusable water bottle – has behind it a second plastic chair traditionally placed in a rehearsal room for a writer, co-director or producer. On this show, it is empty, after the sudden death of Mellor at the age of 71 in 2022. Her absence would be poignant anyway, but it’s even more so as Faye is Mellor’s daughter. In the original plan, Faye would have occupied that second chair as assistant director to Mellor.
“Mum left a very good first draft of the stage version of The Syndicate,” the director explains during lunch. “I’ve worked on that, using her notes on what she wanted to do in the next draft and going back to the TV scripts and adding some bits I felt should be in.”
