Running Time: 2 hours and 15 minutes including interval
Content warnings:
Contains assault, threats of murder, depiction of death by gun wound, multiple instances of smoking marijuana, heroin use via injection, the selling of drugs, excessive violence and threats, gruesome injury, murder, needles and coercive sexual harassment.
References to domestic violence, prescription drug abuse and war (including the Fall of Mogadishu, the Dervish movement and the ethnic cleansing of Palestine). Use of explicit language, blades and blood throughout.
Relaxed Performances at LAMDA
• You are welcome to leave and re-enter from the theatre as you need.
• There is a break-out area available called the Mezzanine
• House lighting is on low throughout, never going to full black-out.
• Loud noises are reduced.
• No strobe lighting is used.
• You are welcome to react to the show however you want.
• At the end of this document is a show synopsis and sensory guide .
Here is a guide to sensory information symbols in this document:
Indicates potentially loud or sudden noises
Indicates bright or sudden lighting changes
Indicates a sad or potentially distressing scene
Indicates fighting, or use of guns/weapons
Indicates audience participation
Arriving at LAMDA
When you arrive at LAMDA, the box office is to your right. You should pick up your ticket here, using your name.
Toilets are located right next to box office.
LAMDA staff will be wearing LAMDA branded T-Shirts or lanyards. If you need any assistance whilst in the building, please ask them.
This is the Theatre Foyer. You may be asked to wait here until the house is open.
You will be shown how to get to the Sainsbury Theatre by an usher.
This performance will take place in the Sainsbury Theatre.
This is the entrance.
When you enter, an Usher will take your ticket from you.
You can sit in any seat. The house lights will stay on low throughout the show.
There is a break-out space called the Mezzanine which you are welcome to use at any point during your visit. It can be accessed via the stairs or lift in the main entrance foyer.
If you aren’t sure about any of this information during your visit please ask an usher or anybody wearing a lanyard.
Before the show begins, the actors will introduce themselves and the characters they are playing.
The lights in the theatre will dim and she show will start. You can leave and re-enter if you need to through the doors you came in through.
At the end of the show the actors will come on and bow. You are welcome to clap at this point if you would like.
The Frontline Company Headshots
MORDECHAITHURROCK
RODERIQUE
Roland Royal Ill SALIM/
Tobias Adetula
JIMMY/COCKBURN/CARLTON
Lewis Bowes
MAHMOUD
Dilip Kumar
KURT / ELLIOT
Ryan Duval
BENNY
Kenndrick Horton
MARCUS
Mostyn Crawford SEAMUS
Oliver Winn
Synopsis
Below is a brief synopsis of the play to aid in contextualizing the following sensory guide.
Saturday night outside the tube: God, strip bars, weed, crack, lost old men, unemployed actors and vegans all collide in a riptide of chaos on the streets of London.
There’s Beth the reformed Christian and Erkenwald the hot-dog seller, old Ragdale on a quest to find his daughter, actor-playwright and egomaniac Mordechai Thurrock, and Cockburn, Elliot and Clayton the dealers and junkies whose trade both sustains and destroys the lives of those around them.
In this vibrant and darkly comic new play, a dozen private stories emerge and their voices give utterance to a storm of subjects and feelings: pop culture and sexual fantasy, the ruins of empire and the delusions of religion, foreign oil and prehistoric London. A panorama of contemporary London encompassing the cruel and the tender, the gutter and the stars.
Below is a sensory guide for the performance that shows potential distressing actions in the play, split up by scenes
ACT 1
Scene 1
The play opens with loud shouting and singing as the actors enter
When the Christians enter they also sing loudly
The Christians then come into the audience handing out leaflets - feel free to interact with them! There is lots of talking and shouting over the top of each other
When Benny and Salim argue over drugs Salim threatens Benny...this eventually breaks out into a fight
After we meet Casey she describes a sexual assault she witnessed on the tube
Cockburn (the drug dealer) threatens Elliot which then breaks out into a fight with lots of shouting
Eventually Cockburn pulls out a knife and is chased away by the street vendors with their weapons
After we meet Val (Elliot’s mother) he rejects her and tells her to go away
There is more talking over each other and lots of shouting to overlap
When we meet Val again she describes how Elliot has hit her in the past and describes the domestic violence she has experienced
------The Interval (15 minutes)------
As Roderique and Beth reconnect he offers her drugs in the form of a needle which she accepts
After the song there are slow white flashing lights on the stage
When Babydoll tells Violet that Marcus has touched her Violet pulls out a blade and chases him
When Mahmoud confronts Kurt about his heritage this leads to a lot of shouting
When Cockburn returns he confronts Mirut he pulls a gun and shoots Mirut in the stomach
There is a very loud sudden gunshot
Mirut dies in Violet’s arms
Violet pepper sprays Cockburn in revenge and fights him
The play ends with white slow flashing lights and a song that gets more intense till everyone is shouting
During the end people will clap and may stand up, cheer or shout to tell the actors they did a good job
