FIND OUT MORE ABOUT
the HOUR BEFORE NIGHTFALL
The Hour Before Nightfall company first came together in September 2025 for the inaugural public, script-in-hand reading of the play at the Soapbox Theatre in Plymouth. Since then the original team of four – director Jo Loyn, actors Derek Frood and Senga Clarke-Côte and playwright Shane Scott – has undergone a couple of significant changes.
Firstly, we were very happy to welcome Ed Jobling to the team in April 2026 in the multi-role of technician, sound, lighting and set coordinator shortly before the play’s second public reading in the church at Warleggan, the village on the edge of Bodmin Moor where the play is set.
The success of that reading led to the decision to tour a full production of the play to a limited number of venues in Cornwall and Devon in the autumn of 2026. Sadly, however, Derek Frood was unable to commit to the pilot tour due to a prior commitment to another project, leaving us without an actor to play the central character, Frederick Densham. A dilemma indeed.
However, in June 2026, we were fortunate to be introduced to accomplished actor Charlie Coldfield, who was both interested in the play’s content and available for the production period. Charlie has now stepped into the role of Densham and is a strong and welcome addition to the Nightfall company.
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the Company
Charlie Coldfield
Actor
Charlie is a Devon-based actor who has worked in theatre and film for over 20 years. He is drawn to work that both entertains and connects with the human condition. Hour Before Nightfall is the story of a unique man whose uncompromising nature results in his apparent madness and provokes us to examine our own choices in life as the clock ticks away. In addition to performing, Charlie has written, directed and produced for theatre and film. He is currently promoting his first feature film Clarke Andrews Tempest.
Senga Clarke-Côté
Actor
Senga is an actor and singer who trained with the National Youth Theatre, The Wheel in Plymouth and on Bristol Old Vic’s screen acting course. Her recent credits include stage productions of The Fair Maid of the Westand Page of Plymouth, a number of short films, including the prize-winning Carclew, commercials for Ginsters and City Plymouth College, and the feature film Dinosaur Hunt. She also has extensive experience performing as a singer/saxophonist. Senga values nuanced roles with depth and complexity that mirror real human experiences. Her background as a mental health professional helps inform her approach.
Ed Jobling
Sound, Lighting, Set Design; Technician
Ed is a performer, maker, technician, film-maker and sound designer. He learned his trade with the renowned comic avant-gardist inventors and performers Forkbeard Fantasy. When Forkbeard stopped touring, he continued applying their multi-disciplinary approach, working with numerous creators including Ruth Mitchell, Four of Swords and Red Herring Productions. He has wandered into opera and has made puppets for Bluebirds Theatre Company. He continues to perform with Emerald Ant in The Iguanodon Restaurant.
Jo Loyn,
Director
Jo has been creating theatre as a director and actor since the early 1980’s. Companies she has worked with include Plymouth Theatre Company, Red Ladder, Barbican Theatre and National Trust Theatre. Alongside Plymouth’s Lyric and Drum Theatres, she has directed and performed work in a variety of accessible settings, including miners’ welfare clubs, community centres, care homes and on-street venues. As a director, her professional productions include an open-air production of Macbeth at the Royal William Yard, Steven Berkoff’s Harry’s Christmas with Conor McIntyre.
Shane Scott
Playwright and Producer
Shane is a Plymouth-based playwright and psychotherapist. He has received studio performances of his work in Plymouth, Bristol and London, including a week-long run of The Bisley Boy in the Drum in 1995, which received an award from the City of Plymouth. In 2010, he completed a Master’s training in dramatherapy at Roehampton University and went on to build a successful psychotherapy practice working with the Internal Family Systems therapeutic model. He recently returned to play writing and has now completely revised a number of full-length stage plays, including Hour Before Nightfall.
The Writing of Hour Before Nightfall by Shane Scott, Playwright.
I find it difficult to pinpoint the exact year I began researching the Frederick Densham story. It must have been in the mid-1990s, shortly after the run of The Bisley Boy in the Drum Theatre in Plymouth.
At that time, I’d been making a living writing a series of guidebooks on the lesser-known places of the United Kingdom. It was when I was researching the edition on Devon and Cornwall that I came upon the story of the enigmatic Reverend Densham.
The more I learnt about Densham’s life, the more he intrigued me, so I made the decision to dig out a microphone and cassette recorder – remember those? – and head for the village of Warleggan on the southern edge of Bodmin Moor to see what more I could discover.
My first port of call was Warleggan’s beautiful little parish church of St Bartholomew. From there, it’s only a few steps to the old rectory, Densham’s former home, since renamed The Rookery and converted into a small number of apartments.
I knocked on the door and received an unexpectedly warm reception, I think by the owner, who allowed me a brief look inside at some of the paintwork created by Densham, most of which seemed preserved behind loose curtains and wall hangings.
The householder spoke at length about Densham and the two decades he spent at the rectory. He also mentioned the names of a number of residents of the village who would still remember Rev Densham and suggested I contact them. I did so, and they agreed to participate in an informal recorded interview. It is these interviews, combined with printed material collected at the time, that formed the basis of my research on Densham’s life story.
I transcribed the interviews, then was faced with the thorny question, how do I turn this intriguing story into a stage play that will hold and entertain an audience of an hour-and-a-half? And where do I start?
I had learnt that Densham’s story had been written about by Daphne du Maurier and others, something that had led to his notoriety spreading across the Atlantic Ocean. I also knew that, shortly before this death, Densham had been interviewed by a journalist and photographer from Life Magazine.
So I made the decision to make this visit the starting point of the play, however with one important proviso: instead of featuring two male pressmen, I chose to make the visiting journalist a young professional woman with an intriguing back story of her own.
The play is driven by the evolving relationship between these two contrasting characters. Their meeting has a profound effect on them both – it allows one to pass on his life's work and die fulfilled, and the other to reconcile herself with the ghosts of her past and move on. A recent audience member described the result as ‘a surprisingly moving piece of theatrical storytelling.’
The Playwright would like to reference and acknowledge thefollowing sources:
• ‘Humanity is the most insane species. We worship an invisible God and destroy a visible Nature, unaware that the Nature we’re destroying is the God we are worshipping.’ (Hubert Reeves, Canadian-French astrophysicist)
• ‘There are stories of people with a relative at the front in wartime, who experienced them return home unexpectedly and then disappear into thin air. Afterwards they discovered the person had died at the very moment of their appearance. We cannot easily explain such events, but we do know that when there are strong bonds of love between people, they can sometimes share thoughts and experiences across great distances.’ (Angela Tilby, Son of God)
• ‘I have spent most of my life seeking something that is just out of reach.’ (Author unknown)
• ‘Trust those who seek the truth, but doubt those who say they have found it.’ (André Gide)
• ‘My atheism, like that of Spinoza, is true piety towards the Universe and denies only gods fashioned by men in their own image to be servants of their human interests.’ (George Santayana)