My Policeman’s David Dawson on the queer history that inspired his new play

David Dawson has managed to step between film, TV and theatre with practised ease. Coming off his most high-profile project to date in My Policeman, Dawson has now been shortlisted for the 2022 Bruntwood Prize for Playwriting and the Original New Voice Award, for The Institute, his play based on real queer history.

For the Laurence Olivier Award-nominated actor, the stage has been a home away from home while he made on-screen appearances in the likes of cult TV shows Peaky Blinders (advisor and accountant, Roberts) and Luther (upper-class psychopath, Toby Kent). Picking up the pen, The Institute is the 40-year-old actor’s professional entry into playwriting.

Centred around Paragraph 175, a provision of the German Criminal Code adopted in 1871 which made homosexual acts between men a crime, The Institute follows Magnus Hirschfeld and the staff of Berlin’s Institute of Sexual in 1919 who are fearlessly dedicated to abolishing Paragraph 175. They created what is believed to be the first pro-gay film in the world, Different From the Others, to show the world that homosexuality was not a deviance. However, with Reichstag’s pressure, changing minds prove to be an uphill battle.

With historical underpinning similarities to Michael Grandage’s My Policeman – in which Dawson played Patrick Hazlewood, the lover of Tom (Harry Styles) who is married to Marion (Emma Corrin) – The Institute delves into this forgotten queer past to unearth realities omitted from our history books. Revealing that “this is one of the first times I’ve had a conversation about The Institute,” Dawson takes us through his journey of researching, writing and developing his play which he hopes to bring to the stage soon.

Congratulations on your Bruntwood Prize nomination. I wanted to start by asking how you came across ‘Paragraph 175’, the inspiration behind The Institute?

It was just before COVID, I’d seen a lot of period drama and I was really hungry to see, on the stage, a play about real queer heroes. I was searching online and came across this place in Berlin called the Institute for Sexual Science. I started learning about Magnus Hirschfeld and then realised that this building was this hub of queer people who were achieving incredible things, and not only worked there but lived there. It was this safe space, a kind of revolution of artistic freedom, at the start of the Weimar Republic.

Magnus and a few others set up the Scientific-Humanitarian Committee and they would hold a conference every year. Some of the speeches they gave on gay rights could have been written yesterday. I just thought it was incredible that this thrived during this time, so I’ve got to tell this story because nobody knows about it either. That started me on this kind of absurd two-year obsession with learning about all of these different people.

I also worked with a charity called Gendered Intelligence, they give guidance to creatives who are passionate about creating roles for trans and non-binary characters in their plays. There are a number of wonderful trans heroes as part of my stories and I was determined to seek out their advice and they gave invaluable support. I wanted to give the ultimate respect and empowerment that these trans heroes deserved. I’m determined for this play to reach the stage with this collaboration that I want with fellow queer creatives.

I imagine Magnus Hirschfeld and his team’s film, Different From the Others, was also essential to your research. It must be amazing to have seen these people existing visually and not just read about them, what was your relationship with the film?

You’ve said something really important there. All these people, that existed and achieved these things back in 1919, have been completely erased. There’s hardly a trace of them. I’m passionate about bringing these people back to life.

I came across the movie after I’d already started to write the story. I found it incredibly moving because Magnus put his partner Karl [Giese] in the movie. It’s kind of modern, it’s alarming the poignancy of it today and how vulnerable our rights are at the moment. There’s also Helene Stöcker an incredible, feminist voice who worked with Magnus fighting for contraceptive rights and abortion rights during this time. That’s incredibly poignant at the moment too. 

In your play, you have these real-life historical figures but little source material and documentation of their lived experience. How was balancing historical accuracy with your imagined world for them as characters?

That’s where the actor in you comes in. The important thing to remember is that these people, though they were achieving great things, and we look back at them as pioneers, they themselves aren’t conscious of that fact. These are just bright, ambitious, sexy, faulted people who are trying to thrive. I would just go on walks with my dog, Dodger, and have conversations with myself, like scenes between people.

After I watched It’s A Sin, I had so much respect for Russell T Davies and everyone who made that, it floored me. I want people to come away from the play, wanting to be a part of that gang. I think that would be my ultimate goal. I want it to be so much fun, that this is not reverential in some way. It’s a celebration of the queer community and its allies.

So it’s more of an ensemble piece in that respect?

Yes. I’m a huge fan of Ryan Murphy’s work, like Horror Story, Feud and Pose, he has a great skill of creating wonderful ensembles of people. The actor in me wants all the people to get a crack of the whip and to get to show off. So absolutely, it’s an ensemble piece. 

You’ve had an extensive stage career as an actor but tell me about your journey as a playwright.

When I was 17, I wrote a play in my little hometown of Widnes and put that on for three nights. Then at 18, I wrote The Boy in the Bed, which was bizarre: he’s not really bedridden, he’s obsessed with Marilyn Monroe, and abuses his carer. I wanted to put it on in London, so I wrote to some of my favourite actors. Julie Walters and Barbara Windsor gave me some money that helped fund it. I actually worked with Julie a few years ago so I got to finally like to thank her. But I’d not written since then. I went to drama school, became an actor, and it became a therapeutic hobby.

Going from writing this play about queer history to playing Patrick in My Policeman, did that research grounding of queer history help inform the character, or even vice versa?

I suppose in terms of my play, the people involved are pushing for rights for queer people. Patrick is living in the society that the people of my play are fighting to get out of. It informed it in terms of none of these people see themselves as victims, but are skilfully thriving in a society in which it’s difficult to do that. In that respect, I have a lot of admiration for Patrick.

I think of Patrick at the end of My Policeman and how there are LGBTQ+ elders in our society who haven’t had their stories told. You’re unearthing this history that shows we’ve always been here, which is so important. 

Exactly that! With The Institute, and for many of these queer people, there wasn’t lineage of children and families to keep those stories alive. I think I’ve taken it on as a personal responsibility to bring these people to the forefront and for them to be celebrated.

When you’re performing, in My Policeman, for example, you have Emma Corrin and Harry Styles to bounce off but how was it to craft characters independently?

I’ve got some wonderful friends that I trust the taste of greatly. I have never been scared to share my piece and get their feedback, it’s the only way I’ll learn. I think over the whole process of two years, I’ve given it to about 10 different people I love dearly. The piece has grown and changed accordingly and they, including gendered intelligence, were a really important part of that process.

Finally, you’re telling the story of The Institute now, why do you feel it resonates at this point in time?

I watched Tom Daley’s Illegal To Be Me and that was an incredibly powerful reminder not to take the laws, privileges and freedoms we have in this country for granted. But there’s still so much more to be done and in many parts of the world to be someone like me would be incredibly difficult. I just wanted to have a play that was a real, great celebration of incredible queer people, all together.

This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.

My Policeman is available to watch now on Prime Video.