CONSIDERED to be Wales' most popular playwright with no less than 30 plays under his prolific belt, Frank Vickery is also a talented and critically acclaimed actor.

Consequently the Rhondda Valley renaissance man will be firing on all cylinders and taking no prisoners when his latest production 'Loose Ends' makes its debut at Abergavenny's Borough Theatre next week, as Chronicle reporter TIM BUTTERS discovered.

"It's one thing to have your words written down all neat and precise on paper, it's another thing entirely to hear them coming back at you from the mouths of actors," explained Frank when reminiscing about his early days as an aspiring playwright making sure and steady progress in his chosen craft.

"Like everything in this world, you learn by mistakes, and my advice to any playwrights out there would be to bring your words to life and make them real and work by attaching yourself to a good amateur dramatics group.

"You can take as many writing classes as you want, but it's only when you hear your words spoken by performing actors, that you'll have a much better understanding of where you're going wrong, what you're doing right, and the pitfalls to avoid."

A keen advocate of his own advice, Frank's career caught flame when he set up his own amateur group to stage his first play.

"The route I took was slightly unorthodox in that a lot of playwrights don't perform their own work.

"Personally I find being a writer helps being an actor, and being an actor helps being a writer.

"The first group I set up stayed together for about 15 years and so it was a brilliant learning curve to act out your own plays alongside other actors and actresses.

"Of course it was also a great and effective way to make sure my first scripts ever saw the light of day."

Frank scored his first major success at the age of 21 when his first comedy 'After I'm Gone' won the Howard De Waldon Trophy for the best one act play in the UK.

Since then, he has written extensively for the theatre, radio and television, steadily building a reputation as a pioneering Welsh playwright and a leading name on the Welsh touring circuit since the early 1990s.

Yet when asked which discipline he preferred - acting or writing? the 59-year-old Frank replied, "It's very difficult to say, but it's a bit of a double whammy I suppose.

"When you're up on the stage getting the laughs as an actor, it's a huge buzz thinking you wrote the jokes as well. I would not really want to choose one over the other, I love them both."

Frank's latest offering 'Loose Ends' centres on a character called Marlene - an interfering and conniving mother with an unbearable influence on her family.

'I love playing Roy in this play ', Frank comments, 'He is hen-pecked and bossed round by Marlene and try as he might, he can't get the last word – like most valley's husbands really! This is definitely one of my funniest comedies.'

The play is set on a weekend break in a caravan in Porthcawl where Marlene - who is played by Di Botcher star of Belonging and the recent Post Office adverts - sets her sights on finding a wife for her son. 

As she plots to get one child hitched, the other one turns up on the run from her husband, just as Marlene reveals the devastating reason for her over-protective and sometimes infuriating behaviour.

This bitter-sweet comedy has been described as classic Frank Vickery farce – packed with hilarious one-liners and moments of pure slapstick from the pen of the man that The Stage have described as having 'one-liners as memorable as ever.'

Unsurprisingly Frank's humorous plays often take their inspiration from the Welsh valleys where he still resides, but interestingly his favourite comedy film is 'Overboard' - the 1987 rom com vehicle for husband and wife team Kurt Russell and Goldie Hawn.

"To me good humour transcends everything," explained Frank, "If something makes you laugh then it makes you laugh and that's all there is to it.

"I often think how could we possibly live without humour? Now more than ever I think it is vital with so much that is bad and negative in the world, that we can still forget about all that is wrong for a short time and just have a laugh."

Frank Vickery will be appearing in Loose Ends at Abergavenny's Borough Theatre for three nights on June 10-12 from 7:30pm.

Tickets £10 (concessions £8) are available from the box office.