West End theatre training enables amputee veterans to share their stories

Wounded military veterans are being trained by West End theatre directors to share their inspirational stories with audiences.

Recruits to initiative Making Generation R have lost limbs through bombs, accidents and illness.

They visit workplaces, schools and educational settings to tell their stories of courage through adversity.

They will start talking to members of the emergency services and the NHS next year after being given the kind of storytelling training actors receive to speak in front of hundreds.

In workshops at Jerwood Space in Southwark, a dozen veterans trained for a gala at the 1,200-capacity Her Majesty’s Theatre taking place in Haymarket today (FRI).

The audience will include not just friends and family but emergency services chiefs, corporate bosses, prison governors and headteachers of pupil referral units, interested in securing the veterans’ speaking services.

Making Generation R - standing for “resilience” - is run by the Drive Project, social enterprise partner of the Blesma charity for limbless veterans.

Speakers include Hammersmith-born bomb disposal expert Jack Cummings, 31, who nearly died while hunting for IEDs in Babaji, Helmand province, in 2010, leaving him in a month-long coma.

The veteran Royal Engineers sapper lost both legs, requiring very high amputations, and needed a throat tracheotomy to breathe.

He hopes to inspire struggling young people seeing his talks to think: “If this guy’s lost his legs but is happy and enjoying life for what it is, so why can’t I?”.

Asked what he hopes to get out of the theatre training, Mr Cummings said: “I normally do a Powerpoint presentation, showing them pictures of bombs and explosions going off, it gets the kids hooked.

“Their faces light up when I’m explaining all this and I want some structure to that.”

He said: “If it wasn’t for my team who grabbed the initial first aid, the incredible doctors and nurses in Camp Bastion, on the helicopter, on the flight home and at Queen Elizabeth hospital, I wouldn’t be here today.

“I’ve heard stories that nurses and doctors were woken up in the night to donate blood because I’d used all the O-positive blood in Bastion.”

Mr Cummings competed in the 2017 Invictus Games in Toronto, winning swimming bronze for breaststroke, and this year’s London Marathon, raising £3,000 for Blesma as a thank-you for his wheelchair.

Kate Beales, a National Theatre director, said: “They’re such courageous people, and yet we’re also asking them to shine light on vulnerability, which is what makes them so incredible as speakers.

“I really love working with them, because they are so open, they have the most astonishing stories, which are heartbreaking, moving, inspiring, and they’re really generous in sharing what they’ve been through and where it’s taking them.”

Grace Staniland, acting managing director of the Drive Project, said: “Making Generation R’s five-day training programme takes Blesma members on a process looking at public speaking and storytelling in order for them to best tell their individual stories of recovery.

“We know the value of professional theatrical practitioners and the experience that they can bring to individuals who have never even through about performing.

“Being able to overcome extreme adversity and bounce back resonates with everybody.”

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