Men Don't Talk: Taking on the epidemic of male silence

​Film-maker Duncan Cowles, main, explores his own and others’ mental health in Silent Men

Playwright Clare Prenton and film-maker Duncan Cowles have spent much of the past few years exploring the same thing – men’s reluctance to talk about their mental health.

Coincidentally, both are showcasing their work at this year’s Scottish Mental Health Arts Festival (SMHAF). Clare Prenton has written a play called Men Don’t Talk which has just started a 15-date Scottish tour, while Duncan Cowles’ film documentary, Silent Men, is also touring Scottish cinemas as part of SMHAF.

Here, the two share how they discovered that, in the right circumstances, men are much more eager to talk than you might think.

Clare Prenton listens in at a session of Peebles Men's Shed

Duncan Cowles: My documentary Silent Men is about mental health, and my own difficulties in expressing emotion and talking about it to my family. The film’s title was there from the beginning as a place-holder really. I thought about changing it because actually there are no silent men in the film. It’s the opposite of that really. But I was told it worked so I just kept it. Clare Prenton: I think it’s a brilliant title. DC: Thanks. Yours is kind of similar.

CP: You hear it in the zeitgeist, don’t you? “Men Don’t Talk.” The Scottish Men’s Shed Association, who I worked with on the play, promote this notion that men don’t talk face to face, they talk shoulder to shoulder. So that’s really where the idea came from. My gut feeling was that men do talk, given the right conditions, but are probably more likely to talk with strangers or people they know less well. It’s very hard having honest conversations with our nearest and dearest. I have a theory that women don’t talk as well, but it’s more nuanced. So I think it does affect women as well. But clearly the statistics are showing that it’s an issue for men far more. It’s interesting, isn’t it, that we’re talking about this at about the same time? Everybody recognises the need. That’s why we got our funding. I think that’s why your film will do so well, and it will be picked up by lots of different people I hope.

DC: One of the things I came across was men worrying that if they opened up about mental health they would be shunned, or that it would be used against them. Or there was a worry that it might hurt the people around them, and so they withheld things from their family that then ended up going on to create more damage down the line. It’s not necessarily how I felt. For me it was just this invisible barrier that I couldn’t quite break through, or couldn’t quite understand, because logically I thought I should be able to.

CP: I think about this a lot, why men don’t talk (about mental health). In my own children, for example, when my son is talking with his pals I’ll ask him a question, like, how is so and so? And he's like, ‘oh, I don't know, we didn’t talk about that.’

The Inverurie Men’s Shed

In my own experience, if there is something difficult to be talked about, a space needs to be created for that, either in a clinical environment or a space like a Men’s Shed. But men seem to be flocking to these non-clinical spaces that are providing that. Andy’s Man Club would be a good example. Their advertising is non- threatening, quite blokey, no fuss. It’s 7pm until 9pm every Monday, come or don’t come, talk or don’t talk. There’s no judgement. You don’t have to pay to come. You can have tea and a biscuit. And there are clubs opening left, right and centre, and that’s showing a need for those spaces. When I started working with Andy’s Man Club last year I think they had 120 clubs or something, and then it became 200, a rapid sort of growth over the last year. That’s telling us something.

Because in the mainstream spaces, in our work spaces, our social spaces, even our family spaces, it’s not possible for some men, I think for the reasons that you’ve alluded to as well, which is about strength. It’s about a particular way of being, looking successful and sorted, and not wanting to bother people or burden them because you don’t think your worry is important enough to be aired.

So you try and fix things yourself. I think we all do that to a certain extent, but maybe men feel more that it’s their job to fix things and to hold things traditionally. ‘Health by stealth’ is a phrase I’ve heard used by Men’s Sheds. Just having a cup of tea with someone and talking about other stuff around it might be as helpful for some people.

DC: I turned up with the camera and actually I found that some people were just ready to let loose. It’s like they were waiting on the opportunity. I remember one guy who didn’t end up in the film, but I was like, ‘can you introduce yourself so I can check the microphone volume?’ And 40 minutes later, he eventually stopped talking and I was like, wow. Like he just was ready to open up. I don’t know what I did, other than just listening. I didn’t have any master techniques other than just pointing the camera and staying quiet and I suppose making people feel at ease. Being quite relaxed and just a one person filming crew probably helped as well.

CP: I think we both met our interviewees in their own territory as well. I mean, I went to the Shed. Meeting people in the space that they’re comfortable was important - and tea, cake and biscuits. I’m not necessarily being facetious when I say that, because I think it was about creating that safe space, and listening, like you say.

DC: Making the film was a very cathartic experience for me. Even though it was very difficult, when I actually made little breakthroughs or managed to go and film something and have a really good conversation, you see in the film a change from where I was. It was like therapy, probably for both parties, because it is sometimes easier to have those conversations with a stranger. It feels very like we’ve both been working in the same kind of mindset, Clare, in the same space.

CP: I think that’s right, although I think your work’s far braver because to put yourself under the spotlight like that is really raw, isn’t it? I can hide behind some of my script. It’s part verbatim but also a lot of it is me as a writer trying to write funny lines and dance around it so it’s not completely verbatim, whereas yours is just this ripping off a plaster and it’s extraordinary for that. I think even from the trailer I got that, and can’t wait to see the whole thing, because it’s really brave of a documentary maker.

Men Don’t Talk tours Scotland until 19 November as part of the Scottish Mental Health Arts Festival. Silent Men is also touring Scotland as part of SMHAF, with screenings at CCA, Glasgow, 19 October, then Aberfeldy (21 October), Dundee (22 October), Dumfries (23 October), Edinburgh (23 October), Inverness (24 October) and Stirling (3 November). For full SMHAF listings visit www.mhfestival.com