INDECENT EXPOSURE: Features - TES Newspaper 22nd May 2009.

When playwright Alan Spence read an article about sexting by Vicki Sheil, he knew he had to start an education project: My Name Is Tom. Alan had one simple objective, to get young people and adults to talk to each other.

“In 2001, I was a trustee for Face Front Inclusive Theatre who devised a play called Text FM. Exploring issues including teen pregnancy, STI’s, sexting, the role of pornography, peer pressure and of consent. In the workshops, how to make informed choices and healthy relationships. With changes in technology and social mores the play became SEX FM, touring very successfully to secondary and special schools every year till 2020”.

Gemma* appears to a frenzied drum and bass soundtrack and begins to strip. She took the video herself, adding the title and music later.. It was for her boyfriend and when they broke up he sent it to some friends. “She was a pupil at another school, but it came to our school and yes, we’ve all seen it.” *Not her real name.

Vicki Sheil's article in 2009, changed all that. Reporting on a disturbing twist in the communi-cations revolution, had resulted in children becoming  major consumers of pornography and with mobile phones they have the opportunity to create content, often using their peers as “performers”.

After reading the article, Alan  told his colleagues… “Teenage relationships had stepped over a very dark and dangerous line”.  And the My Name is Tom education project was born.

My Name is Tom Education Project 2016. A typical teenage love story?

Paris fancies Darnell and he facies her, but he is too shy to. Paris doesn’t give up and they finally date, to become the ‘talk of the town’, most of it online and unrepeatable. When Paris’s parents go away, her plans for a romantic evening and a much needed break from A Level revision, goes all wrong. When her and Darnell are exposed, they are not the only ones. The action takes place in North London in 2011.  The play was very well received by the North London audience…

"I'd like to thank the cast of actors for portraying the experience of young people’s lives. It was very good"       St Anne's pupil.

“This story is current and is one that affects children, our families and our society in a whole. I can guarantee that you or someone you know could relate to this story”   Parent.

"This production has some amazing key messages and the cast are an amazing group of people"     

Emma Rigby. Love Your Doorstep Enfield.

But this was nearly ten years ago, and playwright Alan Spence, is well aware things have got worse, for many teenagers and their families.       Alan was well aware that a fifty minute theatre in education piece, covering issue of sexting and new technology, was not going to solve everyone’s concerns, but it could get people talking.  That was all Alan wanted the play to do; get young people and adults to talk to each other in 2016.

When researching his book, a number of events took over and almost demanded he address the concerns now being raised. Firstly, Miriam Joy Cates MP’s question to Rishi Sunak at PMQ’s on March 8^th 2023,, making serious allegations about the sex education being taught in schools.

“Graphic lessons on oral sex, how to choke your partner safely, and was my Right - Honourable friend aware there were now 72 genders – this is what passes for relationships and sex education in British Schools”

Even before the new sex education regulations had been presented to Parliament, came the powerful television drama Adolescence. Despite being flawed in its handling of school safeguarding procedures, it gained incredible momentum, with the PM inviting the drama to be shown in schools, to ward off the latest crisis, moral panic of masculine toxicity.

Adolescence premiered March 13^th 2025 on Netflix, a subscription channel with over 18 million customers, that same  evening,  BBC Three screened the first part of Stacey Dooley’s  Rape on Trial that garnered nothing like the coverage and interest afforded to Adolescence. Rape on Trial disappeared without trace, but thanks to the intervention of Prime Minister Starmer, Adolescence can now be shown in every secondary school.

In Dooley’s Rape on Trial, four young women give up their right to anonymity and as one said…

“You are a victim of the situation and then you become a victim of the legal system”.

Looking at current conviction rates in rape cases, it does get any more toxic than that. If any programme needs to be taught in schools – age related of course, and will teach young men and women far more than Adolescence ever could, believes Alan. 

The final section of Alan’s book includes three interviews with leading professionals and a powerful rallying call…”Why we need a National Plan for Drama and Theatre education”. To offer both historic and contemporary examples and arguments, because this is a call we have to make for all our futures and future generation.

Alan Spence is a playwright, author, publisher, director and workshop leader now based in Eastbourne. Alan can offer a range of activities for schools, colleges, youth theatres and community organisations including: assemblies and presentations, meet the playwright q&a’s and screenings of the play. Availability from January  2026.  For more information contact Alan at Mob: 07535737247.       Email: theatreisrelife@live.co.uk