We are Living Stories Productions, an independent writing and storytelling production company which started in 2018, borne out of a passion for creating children’s stories for the writers children. From it’s first writings, we expanded into developing and posting videos which are read out by our storyteller.
We are Living Stories Productions, an independent writing and storytelling production company which started in 2018, born out of a passion for creating children’s stories for the writer’s children. From it’s first writings, we expanded into developing and posting videos which are read out by our storyteller Ellen Swailes. The original idea came from our writer, Gerrard O’ Driscoll, with considerable contributions from his children, having to make up bedtime stories many years ago.
Eventually, pen was put to paper and Barry and George, amongst other friendly characters, became a reality and our story of Living Stories Productions started.
A chance encounter over two coffees between ourselves is really where our story came to life. The aim: wanting to share them with as many people as possible.
Being both dyslexic, we really wanted to bring the stories to life and make story telling accessible to all, through the videos on our channels. We understand the importance of a good book and the different dynamics that a visual representation can bring.
Reading aloud, encourages the listener to immerse themselves in the reader’s voice and characteristics. We’re both passionate about the spoken word and working in a collaborative way has allowed us to combine two media’s and portray our own interpretation of storytelling.
Along the way, we have drawn on our varied backgrounds to develop our production techniques. The process is exciting and continues to evolve which we apply to every new video that we make.
Each one has been approached as a separate production, with the appropriate attention to detail that both of us take pride in. We see this project as a journey, which we want to share and make storytelling as accessible as possible.
We hope you enjoy our website and the stories, if you’d like to see more from us, get in contact… Let’s get started!
I have always had a love for the arts for as long as I can remember, so it felt natural to me to take this as my career path.
With a passion of text at school I felt most at home exploring this within my drama lessons. This led me to train for three years in Plymouth with the Actors Wheel, after graduating in 2018 with a BA Hons in Acting I have currently been working in the arts industry even since from theatre, screen and stage management.
When I started working on Living Stories Productions, I initially started with the role of story teller however with time, guidance and trust from Gerrard the projects founder I have now taken on new roles, including helping to produce the videos as well as getting the opportunity allow the reader to visually see how I imaging the characters worlds though my illustrations.
Each story we produce we try to learn from, adapting each one on our story telling adventure.
Ellen trained with The Actors Wheel Company at Plymouth Marjon University for three years, achieving a BA Hons degree in Acting. While training she had roles in various theatre tours, including a tour of the South West playing the role of Dorcus in “The Winter’s Tale” 2016, along with being part of the ensemble in an international tour of “Oedipus” 2017. In 2018 Ellen played Miss Burstner in a national tour of “The Trial” 2018. Since graduating Ellen has continued to work in the acting industry in addition to working behind the scenes with many production projects and Stage Management Roles.
Some of her work has consisted of being part of the production team for Nickelodeon during the recording of the Broadway show “SpongeBob the Musical”, working in the film production team on ‘WALDEN’, Sonia Friedman Productions, The Harold Pinter Theatre along with working in the production team for ‘Katherine Jenkins Christmas Spectacular, From The Royal Albert Hall’. Ellen's most recent project has been working in the Stage Management team for The Barbican Theatre taking the performance ‘Petrol Headz’ on tour around the South West this summer.
It was not until I had children did I actually create something from scratch and it was children’s stories
My background is very traditional in education and career, but I have always had an interest in the creative arts, particularly the visual arts. Anything visual interests me such as architecture and especially design of any kind. Over the years I have tried to apply interesting design to my everyday life, however small or insignificant the item may be. I am a great believer in form over function.
However, it was not until I had children did I actually create something from scratch and it was children’s stories. When my children were very young, they used to ask me to read them a bedtime story. One evening I was so tired and did not have a book to read, so I made up a story about two crocodiles. That was the beginning of Barry and George's adventures.
A few years later I managed to put pen to paper and decided to have them read out by an actor/ storyteller. I met Ellen who is an actor with a strong background in production and we developed the various channels to display the storytelling videos and the project developed.
