Making Myra: reconstructing an icon of evil

by Pete Hartley

Making Myra is a play for three actors.What made Myra Hindley into the most notorious icon of serial killing evil? Her background? Her upbringing? Ian Brady? All of these or none of them? Was she simply the product of her times as northern England emerged from post-war austerity into the heady petrol, vinyl, and hairspray fuelled youth culture of the sixties? Or was she just a psychological anomaly? Was there anything anyone could have done to avert the terrible crimes that sealed her fate and destroyed the lives of five families between 1963 and 1966?Making Myra opens on 9th July 1980, the day on which Myra’s younger sister Maureen died. Myra is confronted by Maureen’s ghost and taken back two decades as Maureen makes her sister hunt for the reasons for her appalling offences. The encounter opens old wounds, as it was Maureen and her husband who handed Ian Brady over to the police and testified against him and Myra at their trial.Making Myra provides an audience with the unique opportunity to witness the bitter clash of the siblings as they scrap and argue over the events leading up to the notorious killings that took place on Saddleworth Moor.The staging requirements for this play are simple and straightforward.Playing time is approximately 80 minutes. Audience feedback from the premiere “Probably the most well-balanced and realised depiction of Hindley we’re likely to see in our lifetimes.” “Making Myra manages to approach the subject matter without portraying Hindley as either a tragic hero or helpless victim whilst at the same time making her more than a mere pantomime villain.” “Very thought provoking and poignant with some electric and sinister moments that made me shudder.”“I found the performance to be a poignant tribute to all of the victims of the moors murderers. The story was gritty and had the audience spiralling through a vast array of emotions.”

45 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 3, 2012

About the author

Pete Hartley is based in northern England where he taught drama for three decades and ran uneasy theatre - a small production company specialising in creating new drama and reworking established classics.

He has written extensively for the stage. Some fifty of his plays have been performed by professionals, amateurs and student companies. Six have won prizes, and one, was broadcast by BBC Radio.

Pete also had short stories published and broadcast long before the digital era dominated the airwaves.