Wounded Storytellers
An Evaluation of Power Play’s HOLLOWAY documentary project
Carly Guest & Rachel Seoighe
Acknowledgements
We would like to express our thanks to the Power Play team and all the women who participated in the HOLLOWAY project for generously engaging with the evaluation process. Many thanks to Magali Peyrefitte for taking the time to read and comment on the evaluation draft. Thank you to Erika Flowers for the beautiful illustrations of the HOLLOWAY theatre/documentary process.
This evaluation project was awarded ethical approval by the Middlesex University School of Law Ethics Committee.
1.1 Evaluation approach and criteria
HOLLOWAY by Power Play productions is a forum theatre and documentary project. Six women with experience of imprisonment in HMP Holloway, London, returned to the prison and explored memories of Holloway, critiques of the prison system and the structural factors that shaped their journeys to prison. This evaluation reflects on Power Play’s trauma informed practice and offers best practice recommendations for similar future projects by other organisations.
This evaluation draws on project documents, pre-production questionnaires, pre- and post-production interviews with participants, interviews with Power Play, and theatre-documentary rushes. Four evaluation criteria were established from the project aims and objectives, pre-production participant questionnaires and pre- and post-production interviews with women participating in the project. These ask:
• Did the return to Holloway and participation in the Power Play project create opportunities for healing and transforming personal narratives?
• Did the process give women the opportunity to be part of and contribute to the (re)telling of the history of Holloway?
• Were the women able to give voice to others and advocate for women in prison?
• Is the film and process able to change public perception and creating systemic change?
1.2 Evaluation summary
The evaluation covers the project foundations, procedures and processes (section 5.) and tensions and challenges in the process (section 6.)
Project foundation, procedures and processes were trauma-informed in design and practice, including:
• Extensive consultation with a steering committee of trusted women with professional and lived experience of the criminal justice system, and with theatre and workshop expertise.
• The participants being valued as experts by experience, with their views listened to throughout.
• The filming crew, support team, and facilitator all chosen in line with the principles of the project, their experience and with the women’s interests in mind.
• Detailed project documents, including a trauma-informed code of conduct and support plan, demonstrated the intention to create an inclusive, considerate, and respectful working environment.
• Two therapeutic caseworkers supported the women before, during and after filming.
• The women’s wellbeing, comfort and experience was prioritised over directorial or artistic decisions.
• A thoughtful interview approach validated the women’s emotional experiences of return to prison.
• Breathing exercises were used to create connection and to respond to moments of distress.
• Opening and closing rituals attended to the experience of the workshops and created spaces for reflection and processing.
Tensions and challenges that arose during the project included:
• Affording women autonomy to explore the building conflicted with a need for direction for filming.
• The production schedule, determined by building access, project content and stages, placed pressures on timing. Late arrivals impacted on the character and atmosphere of the space.
• The freedom to explore the building contrasted with the women’s experience of incarceration and control in the space and, at times, created a sense of disorientation.
• The trust the women had in the process was challenged when the group started to doubt the team, requiring a careful listening session and renegotiation on boundaries.
• The therapeutic need for the women to remain present and grounded sometimes conflicted with the production need to record experiences for the documentary.
Power Play’s trauma-informed principles and practice meant that the team were well-equipped to respond to tensions and challenges in collaboration with the women, ensuring that women’s needs remained at the heart of the project
1.3 Recommendations for similar future projects
• Develop trauma-informed and person-centred project documents.
• Develop clear and appropriate communication styles with participants.
• Create ample space, time and resources for therapeutic support.
• Pay participants well for their time.
• Continuously and meaningfully seek informed consent throughout the entire project.
• Incorporate reflexivity and willingness to change into the process.
• Consider and enhance participants’ familiarity and comfort with process and techniques.
• Create clear and well-planned dissemination plans.
The HOLLOWAY project by Power Play productions is a forum theatre and documentary project that worked with six women with experience of imprisonment in Holloway prison to explore their memories of prison and work together to envisage reform of the female criminal justice system. The project also wanted to facilitate the women’s healing; by returning to the prison before it was demolished, it was hoped that the women could gain closure and tell their stories in a cathartic and connecting process. The women’s stories and experiences recorded in the theatre workshops and exercises will also become part of a local history archive, in collaboration with Islington Museum and women’s prison charities. Power Play also aims to integrate the final documentary into a public programme of discussions and advocacy, drawing on the women’s insights and expertise to inform and shape debates on women’s imprisonment.
Power Play is a feminist arts organisation led by an all-women team. Their mission is “to tell women’s stories of injustice, shedding light on key areas of social and economic injustice.” They aim to “create safe and empowering frameworks for women with lived-experience of trauma or deprivation to express their livedexperiences and ensure these are heard by audiences and specific stakeholders alike’ (Power Play website). By developing relationships and working collaboratively with organisations and charities that support women with experience of prison (through the arts and otherwise), advocacy groups connected to Holloway prison, Islington Museum and academics since 2018, Power Play developed a framework and plan for the HOLLOWAY project. Through these networks, they were introduced to women interested in taking part in the project, six of whom eventually participated The filming process in Holloway Prison included: a group introduction and walk around the prison grounds and site on the first day; individual interviews with the women; what we call conversational ‘memory walks’ with the women – some alone, some in pairs; and the facilitated group workshops.
As academics, we have studied the impact of Holloway’s closure and women’s memories of Holloway in the wider context of women’s imprisonment since the prison’s closure in 2016. We have used and developed a range of creative methodologies to explore women’s memories and relationship with the prison, and wider society’s understanding of the prison space. These methods include photograph analysis, site visits, archival explorations and poetry (Guest and Seoighe 2019, 2021, 2022). In early conversations with Power Play about their project as it developed, we agreed to evaluate the forum theatre and documentary process and - following a feminist and user-focused evaluation approach (Sielbeck-Bowen et al, 2002; Patton 2022) - we engaged consistently with Power Play throughout the project, offering feedback and guidance. We also aimed to ensure that our approach met their evaluation needs and the needs of others intended users,
including other arts organisations intending to work with women who have experienced trauma, particularly those with experience of the criminal justice system.
This evaluation focuses particularly on the week of activities, interviews and forum theatre workshops organised and filmed by Power Play in Holloway prison in the summer of 2021. Evaluating this process in its entirety, we include the preparations for filming and the aftercare provided in the scope of our evaluation. We begin with a brief review of relevant literature and similar evaluations, in order to place the project and the evaluation in context. We then set out the methodology we used to carry out the evaluation, including an explanation of how we developed our evaluation criteria.
The Power Play HOLLOWAY production differs from many prison theatre or arts projects and their evaluations: the prison in question has closed and the women formerly imprisoned there are revisiting the space as free and willing participants. Yet, research on the use of theatre in prisons and evaluations of similar projects are useful to review in terms of how they measure the impact and value of theatre interventions with those with experience of the criminal justice system. We follow van der Meulen and Omstead (2021) in a call to disengage with the institutional focus on rehabilitation and reducing recidivism written into these projects, and the methods and measures by which they are evaluated. Some arts-based prison programmes have been evaluated in terms of their economic value, attempting to explore their value through a neoliberal lens “that valorizes austerity and decreased social spending that disproportionately affects already-marginalized peoples” (van der Meulen and Omstead 2021: 108; Johnson et al 2011).
There is a focus in existing evaluations on the rehabilitative aims and function of the theatre intervention, with an emphasis on individual behavioural change and the theatre exercises framed as “realistic skills rehearsal” for “offenders” (Stevenson and Watson 2018: 16). Theatre companies often frame their offerings in prison as addressing “risk factors for criminal behaviour” (imagine if 2017). imagine if theatre company, for example, framed their ‘Bird on a Wing’ project as enhancing interpersonal skills, communication skills, employability and personal narratives ahead of prisoner release (imagine if 2017).This is in the wider context of ‘responsibilisation’ of women (Hart 2017; Barr 2019) and programs focused on ‘correcting’ their behaviour and building their capacity to make more ‘rational’ and ‘logical’ decisions risk ignoring the social, political, economic and trauma-related contexts for behaviour (van der Meulen and Omstead 2021; Pollack 2004).
An evaluation of Geese Theatre’s work, for example, emphasises how their interventions are designed to “help offenders become conscious of and reflect on their thoughts, feelings, and ability to make decisions,” aiming to pivot participants towards creating “new, prosocial roles” (Stevenson and Watson 2018: 16-17). The company’s use of ‘masks’ as a metaphor in exercises resonated with themes that emerged in the Power Play project. Through performances, Geese Theatre participants were seen to reveal “vulnerabilities, insecurities and fears which might otherwise remain hidden” (Watson 2009; Stevenson and Watson 2018). The self-exploration exercises in these interventions are often designed to enable women to survive the prison environment, tackling issues of self-esteem, depression, anger and hopelessness (Stevenson and Watson 2018). Other evaluations also measure the success of theatre projects in prison by their potential to bring about personal transformation in the service of rehabilitation. For example, levels of anger were
assessed among male prisoner participants in theatre projects (Reiss et al 1998; Blacker et al. 2008), as well as “self-efficacy, motivation to change and improved confidence in skills,” including dealing with authority and self-control (Harkins et al 2008). A 2009 evaluation of another Geese Theatre intervention framed the project’s value as increasing oral language competence so that “offenders” could derive maximum benefit from prison programmes “addressing their offending behaviour” (Harkins et al 2009: 3). Their concluding call is for more research to develop this area and “address criminogenic needs” (Harkins et al 2009: 12). In these studies, there is an ideological commitment to rehabilitation that situates the ‘problem’ firmly with the individual ‘offenders’ rather than structural forces that shape criminalised individual’s lives. The value of the interventions is their development of skills as “key components of rehabilitation” (Harkins et al 2009: 10; Antonowicz and Ross 1994).
Theatre projects can, however, offer and narrate both the value of personal transformation - emotional and skills-based development - and social critique and transformation. Perhaps the most well-known theatre company working with women in prison and with experience of the criminal justice system in the UK is Clean Break, who have had a profound cultural and educational impact in their four decades of work (Walsh 2018). Though Clean Break’s Head of Education has emphasised that personal narratives of transformation are significant for women who have been involved with the company (Hermann 2009; Walsh 2018), the principles established by its founders - themselves formerly imprisoned women - have been upheld. Clean Break make “excellent quality theatre that challenges a wider understanding of women affected by criminalisation” and offer artistic skills training that has transformed not only individual women’s lives but also the theatre industry (Walsh 2018: 23). The focus is on structural critique and change, through creative public education and practical and emotional support for women. Studies of Clean Break’s work have emphasised that women reported a sense of safety, empowerment, feeling seen and heard, while exploring alternatives to cycles of crime and striving for achievement. The experience afforded a sense of community that resulted in confidence, re-connection to the body, creative collaboration and the flexibility “needed in performance and building capacity to improvise (or react to the unexpected)” (Walsh 2018: 24). Clean Break has supported women to do identity-work in a communal, creative and affirming way in a ‘safe space’ (Merril and Frigon 2015). The facilitator of the Power Play theatre workshops is a member of Clean Break and brought this ethos and subtlety to the HOLLOWAY project. As our evaluation demonstrates, Power Play’s approach was not to focus on desistance or to facilitate behavioural change, but to use theatre exercises to facilitate women’s critiques of the prison system and exploration of the structural factors that shaped their journeys into Holloway Prison. In doing so, the project needed to guard against the “uncritical acceptance of the institution’s value and goals” that many prison arts programmes demonstrate (van der
Meulen and Omstead, 2021: 108) and to evidence the projects value without narratives that “uphold individualized and pathologized understandings of crime, and which invisibilize myriad salient social factors” (van der Meulen and Omstead 2021: 108). The measures of evaluation articulated in the arts-based method outlined by van der Meulen and Omstead (2018) were useful coordinates for us: community building and artistic engagement, and amelioration of the carceral experience through joyful and fun activities. In the next section, we outline how we developed measures of evaluation for Power Play’s specific project.
4.1 Feminist evaluation
Our evaluation approach is guided by principles of feminist evaluation (fig.1), of which one aim is to advocate for social change. We see this evaluation of the Power Play documentary making process as part of the wider project of advocating for and changing the narrative around women in prison and the place and practice of punishment and imprisonment in contemporary society. As will become evident in sections 4.24.3, which outline the measure we use to evaluate the process, our aim here is not to consider whether the workshop and documentary making process can contribute to quantitative measures such as desistance, rehabilitation or reoffending, both for the women participating and in terms of its wider impact on audiences. We are instead working from a political stance that is deeply sceptical and critical of these concepts and the role they place in a broader narrative that justifies and reinforces the criminal justice system and the pivotal role that imprisonment plays in that system.
Therefore, whilst many evaluations of activities that take place in prisons and with formerly formerly/imprisoned individuals use concepts such as desistance, rehabilitation, recidivism or behaviour change as measures for the success of the programme, we have established evaluation criteria that are founded, primarily, in the hopes and expectations of the women participating in the project – as they outline in questionnaires and evaluation interviews, and, secondly, in the stated aims of Power Play to produce a documentary project that can change the narrative on imprisonment, particularly the imprisonment of women. Inevitably, there is some overlap in the two sets of concerns. In using the hopes and expectations of the women involved in the project to set the evaluation criteria we are following principles 4-6 of feminist evaluation (Fig 1, Sielbeck-Bowen et al, 2002), which engage epistemologically with the nature of knowledge and knowledge production.
In recognition of how knowledge is constructed and the privileging of certain forms and producers of knowledge, we draw on qualitative methods that prioritise the voice and experience of the women who participated in the workshops and interviews. What we aim to do in this evaluation is reflect on the achievements and challenges of the project through the accounts of the women who participated. This approach also follows the third key principle of feminist evaluation – that evaluations are inherently political and the positionality of the evaluator will lead to a particular political stance. We are explicit about our abolitionist feminist political stance and this directs the approach we adopt for this evaluation. We are concerned with the ways in which gender inequalities interact with and sustain social harms, and the systemic and structural reproduction of these inequalities (principles one and two of the feminist
evaluation). It is this political stance that drives the ways in which we evaluate this process (qualitative methods) and the measures by which we are evaluating it (identified by the women who participated and who are from an often marginalised and stigmatised group). This is deliberately in contrast to the approach of measuring success through desistance and behaviour change measures. Not only do these measures often diminish the voices of the individuals involved and reduce complex human behaviour and experience to a set of quantifiable measures, they also locate the need for change in the individual and feed into a notion of the criminalised person as inherently ‘bad’ and in need of change, rather than adopting a structural and systemic understanding of the causes and consequences of behaviours and actions that may lead to imprisonment.
Following Jara Dean-Coffey (2020), our approach was shaped by an understanding that being an evaluator is a position of power and responsibility - towards the work being evaluated and towards ourselves. Bringing critical insights from our research on Holloway prison and the wider imprisonment of women, our evaluation is guided by a concern with emotion - including our own - as a source of knowledge and an interest in ‘abolitionist affect’ - an emotional engagement with and response to dominant carceral logics, framed by and productive of abolitionist principles (Guest & Seoighe 2019, 2021). We carried out the evaluation with users in mind, aiming to support and inform future projects and decision-making based on meaningful evidence, personal interpretation, and to engage reflexive deliberation (Patton 2022). The evaluation findings will be useful to Power Play to inform their future work, and to other creative practitioners planning projects with marginalised, often traumatised women, particularly with experience of the criminal justice system.
As evaluators working from a feminist, transformative (Bolinson and Merton 2019; Sielbeck-Bowen et al, 2002) and utilisation-focused approach (Patton 2022), we offered feedback on Power Play’s Ethical and Editorial Approach document, in written form and in a reflective conversation. For us, care, organisational learning and a commitment to social justice were primary principles of the evaluation, which meant that we viewed the process as the outcome and worked with the directors to facilitate evaluative learning throughout, allowing for development and reiteration in response to feedback. We engaged consistently with Power Play to ensure that our approach met their evaluation needs, and - considering the wider usefulness of the work - hope to offer an emotion-led alternative to the often-reductive measures of criminal justice evaluations.
Key principles of feminist evaluation (Sielbeck-Bowen et al, 2002)
1. Feminist evaluation has as a central focus the gender inequities that lead to social injustice.
2. Discrimination or inequality based on gender is systemic and structural.
3. Evaluation is a political activity; the contexts in which evaluation operates are politicized; and the personal experiences, perspectives, and characteristics evaluators bring to evaluations (and with which we interact) lead to a particular political stance.
4. Knowledge is a powerful resource that serves an explicit or implicit purpose. Knowledge should be a resource of and for the people who create, hold, and share it. Consequently, the evaluation or research process can lead to significant negative or positive effects on the people involved in the evaluation/research.
5. Knowledge and values are culturally, socially, and temporally contingent. Knowledge is also filtered through the knower.
6. There are multiple ways of knowing; some ways are privileged over others.
4.2 Evaluation criteria
As outlined, we are evaluating this project primarily on the terms set by the women participating, alongside Power Play’s aims and objectives for the project from the outset. This approach aligns with the principles of feminist evaluation (Sielbeck-Bowen et al, 2002) that question and challenge the dominant productions of knowledge and the feminist abolitionist principles adopted by us as evaluators and by Power Play. In centring the hopes and expectations of the women who participated in the project, we are prioritising their ideas of how the success of a project of this kind can be measured, rather than imposing our own measures on the process. In doing so we are rejecting the standard evaluation measures often used for projects related to the CJS and formerly /imprisoned groups (desistance, behaviour change, rehabilitation etc), which too often speak to carceral aims and principles. Our evaluation measures are derived from three sources: the Power Play documents detailing the aims, objectives and processes of the project; the pre-production questionnaires completed by three of the women; and seven pre- and post-production interviews with five of the women participating in the project. We draw on the aims and objectives for the project detailed in Power Play’s ‘Ethical and Editorial Approach’ document which states that the core aims were:
● To share, not extract.
● To challenge inequalities in process as well as output.
● To create a film of the highest artistic standard.
● To be trauma-informed, compassionate and real throughout.
● To value participants as (paid) creative collaborators.
● To follow fair and open pathways for decision-making and accountability.
● To build capacity for participants to self-advocate & amplify their existing work.
Four central evaluation criteria were identified from the women’s responses to a Power Play questionnaire and our evaluation interviews:
• Healing and transforming personal narratives
• Being part of Holloway’s history
• Giving voice to others
• Changing public perceptions and creating systemic change
These are described in more detail here:
Healing and transforming personal narratives
The first evaluation criteria we have identified is that participating in the project would be healing in some form. For some, this hoped-for healing was directly related to the return to the building, seeing it in a dilapidated and decaying state, or returning to cells and other familiar places. It was also anticipated that returning to the space as a free person would be an empowering and enlightening experience. There was also the expressed hope for an emotional connection with the site and that the process that would give the opportunity to tell their story, relive their experience of Holloway, to honour past lives and achieve a sense of closure and safety.
Being part of Holloway’s history
Some of the women expressed a desire to be part of the history of Holloway as a motivation for participating in the documentary process. Being part of the history also offered the opportunity to contribute to the narratives surrounding Holloway’s closure. For some of the women, this meant being able to offer a comprehensive account of Holloway and its history, including the work of the officers and other staff. For others, returning to the building post-closure - a space so few people had access to - would feel like a historic event in itself and was something important that they wanted to be part of.
Giving voice to others
Each of the women we spoke to expressed hope for the opportunity to not only tell a personal story, but to also act as a voice and advocate for other criminalised women. The desired impact of this was twofold: firstly, to humanise criminalised women by sharing stories to help viewers understand women’s experiences of imprisonment and see women as more than ‘prisoners’ and secondly, that the stories might reach women and young girls in circumstances similar to their own prior to imprisonment and that seeing their stories on screen might offer hope and support.
Changing public perception and creating systemic change
Finally, perhaps the most strongly expressed hope for the project was that it will change public perception and contribute towards systemic change. There was a wish for the documentary to be seen by members of the public, but also policy makers and practitioners. All the women reflected on the power and importance of storytelling as a mechanism for social change and hoped that the documentary would generate conversations about the failings of the prison system and the need for trauma-informed women’s services.
4.3 Evaluation questions
The women’s hopes and expectations for the process - alongside Power Play’s stated core aims - form our evaluation criteria for this project and the related questions that we are asking of the process. Some of these are difficult to assess at the time of writing, particularly the impact and reach of the not-yet-released documentary. These limits are reflected in our questions. The questions we are asking of the project are:
• Did the return to Holloway and participation in the Power Play project create opportunities for healing and transforming personal narratives?
o What did the participants report about their experience following the completion of the project?
o Were there opportunities to return to cells and other places of significance in the prison?
o Did the workshops create spaces for emotional connection with the prison and experiences of imprisonment?
o Did Power Play create a safe, inclusive and trauma-informed process and space for these emotions to be explored? If so, how?
• Did the process give women the opportunity to be part of and contribute to the (re)telling of the history of Holloway?
o Were the women’s accounts of their experience of Holloway given space, time and respect, even in their difference and diversity?
o Was there discussion about/reflection on how diverging accounts of Holloway would be incorporated into the process?
o Was adequate space and time given to the women to explore the space and experience the return to the building as a historic event in and of itself?
• Were the women able to give voice to others and advocate for women in prison?
o Did the women feel that they were able to speak as advocates and give voice to the experience of imprisonment through and beyond their own specific experiences?
o Did the interviews, memory walks and workshops give women the opportunity to highlight the various factors and vulnerabilities that contribute to women’s imprisonment?
o Were the women’s expertise, experience and, (where relevant) professional advocacy work given space, time and respect during the process?
o Was there opportunity for the women to amplify their existing work with formerly /imprisoned women, or women and girls?
• Is the film and process able to change public perception and creating systemic change?
o Did the questions, activities, and other aspects of the process allow for the opportunity to move beyond the personal to discussion and analysis of wider systemic issues?
o Did Power Play’s approach and attitude make the link between personal stories and systemic issues?
o Were Power Play committed to creating social change through the documentary?
o Are there plans for dissemination that consider a wide range of audiences, including reaching policy makers and politicians?
In this evaluation we discuss aspects of the process, challenges and tensions we observed through the materials described in section 4.4. We reflect on this evaluation criteria throughout and in section 7 consider to what extent the criteria have been met. We do this through discussion of and reflection on the project foundations, procedures and processes in section 5 and the tensions and challenges in practice in section 6.
4.4
Evaluation methods
In our evaluation, we drew on a range of materials to understand the development of the project, the preparatory stages, workshops, interviews and the aftercare provided. These materials include:
• Support and process documents, developed by Power Play:
• Support Plan
o Document outlining the project’s core activities, the project team and the production principles.
• Ethical and Editorial Approach
o Document outlining: the project’s core aims, the focus of the film, Power Play’s position on the prison system and reflections on how the prison will be presented. Approach to working with participants, interview, journalistic and editing practices and impact and distribution plans.
• Organisational Procedures and Policies
o Document outlining: the mission statement, key personnel, code of conduct, policies on bullying and harassment, health and safety, environmental policy, data and privacy, equal opportunities, financial management, and legal structures and governing documents.
• Questionnaire and interviews
o Responses to a pre-production questionnaire developed by Power Play and completed by three of the six women participating in the project (see appendix 1 for questionnaire)
o Pre- and post-production interviews with the women taking part in the workshops, conducted by us as evaluators. Of the six women involved, five were interviewed at least once. Two women were interviewed both before and after participation in the workshops (see appendix 2 for interview questions).
o Post-production conversations with Power Play Lead Producer Polly Creed and Creative Director Sophie Compton.
• Workshop rushes
o We were given access to the rushes of the filming. This included unedited interviews and memory walks with each of the women and five days of forum theatre workshops, involving all six women.
5.1 Procedures and policies: feminist, radically inclusive and caring practice
In this section, we consider the process by which Power Play set up the HOLLOWAY project and the support infrastructure put in place. All the documents underpinning the HOLLOWAY project are written through with care, attention to detail, and a trauma-informed approach that acknowledges the agency, resilience and creative contributions of the women. A core principle of the project (and of the production company) was to build the structures of the project in consultation with participants. This was achieved through careful and iterative conversations with the women and a written questionnaire exploring the women’s objectives and needs, in preparation for the workshops and documentary filming process. While the questionnaire was responded to in writing by only 3 out of 6 women, each of the women we interviewed felt that they had sufficient space to explore their motivations and expectations of the project with the directors ahead of filming. They also felt held and supported throughout.
It is notable that the directors shared the project documents with a HOLLOWAY steering committee throughout the process, actively seeking feedback on their procedures and practice. This committee was made up of trusted women with professional and lived experience of the criminal justice system, and with theatre and workshop expertise. Committee members offered comments on the project’s foundational documents and - through critical and reflective conversations - the directors adapted and refined the process and procedures. The project support plan and Ethical and Editorial Approach documents were collaboratively and significantly adapted and refined in an online conversation, where the steering committee offered detailed guidance and feedback.
The core aim of valuing participants as creative collaborators – articulated in the Ethical and Editorial Approach document – extended to discussions with the women about the processes of practical and emotional support they needed to fully and safely contribute to the project. The creative and the ethical elements of participation were intertwined throughout – women were also asked in conversations and in the questionnaire how they would like to see the prison represented, what representational imagery or language should be avoided, and were invited to suggest creative content as inspiration for the documentary.
The filming crew, support team, facilitator and steering groups were all carefully chosen in line with the principles of the project, their experience and with the women’s interests in mind. The crew, for example, was made up exclusively of women and non-binary people, to minimise gendered power dynamics and fear that can arise particularly for women who have experienced gender-based discrimination, violence or
trauma. These employment decisions were also shaped by a commitment to tackling discrimination and sexism towards self-identifying women and non-binary people in the arts industry (in line with the Equality Act 2010, Part 1, Schedule 9, as described in the Organisational Procedures and Policies). The women supporting the project in various capacities brought diverse experience and expertise across academia, advocacy, creative production and participant engagement. Many had previously worked directly with women in Holloway Prison and had a deep understanding of the prison, the socio-economic, emotional, physical and practical issues faced by women who were imprisoned there, and the complex and varied ways that women experienced their time in the prison.
A trauma-informed code of conduct was developed for the project, which was signed by all participants and crew. Key elements of this code of conduct included: confidentiality; equity and the creation of empathetic and respectful/safe spaces; and guidelines on when to film and when not to film. The code was adapted from a more general code written for Power Play employees, which sets expectations around working practices and principles for external partners and creative collaborators. This adapted code of conduct was the centre of an online conversation with the crew ahead of filming, setting up the principles of practice that would define the process. In order to emphasise the importance of the code of conduct and ensure that it was present in everyone’s minds and integrated into daily practice, Power Play read through the core principles of the code and the ‘Equity Safe Spaces Guideline’ on set on the first morning of filming. The guidelines were then printed out and hung up in the marquee used by both the crew and contributors during filming. Some of the crew may have missed the moment on the first day where these principles were verbally reiterated: illnesses and Covid-19 meant that there was more staff turnover than expected, with some only on set for one day. However, the directors felt that the crew were well prepared ahead of time with discussion and trauma-informed training offered through a crew check-in day. The principles underpinning the filming process were also visible in the marquee.
Power Play’s foundational documents, including the Bullying and Harassment Policy and Equality Policy, are detailed, thoughtful and reflect the desire to create and protect radically inclusive, considerate, caring and respectful working environments and relationships. The procedures in place to address issues and to report incidents are clearly articulated and sensible, centring communication, awareness and self-awareness, and transparency of process. The policies are also alive to the emotional and relational complexity of making a complaint, and how emotions and expectations in relation to the complaint may change over time.
The Support Plan document describes what activities formed part of the documentary and filming process, and how and when caseworkers were available to the women. Power Play did a recruitment drive for caseworkers through trusted organisations such as Women in Prison and Clean Break and used social media
networks. Two caseworkers were appointed who came with relevant expertise and whose approaches and identities were expected by Power Play to work in a complementary way. Each woman was allocated a caseworker ahead of the filming process, in an individualised process that centred the slow building of trust. When allocating caseworkers, Power Play considered additional layers of race and other identities that might offer a greater sense of safety and connection to the women. They also considered personality and matched women with caseworkers they felt they would connect with. Each woman had a one-on-one conversation with her caseworker as part of a risk assessment several weeks before filming began to ensure that women were sure about their participation in the project and to talk through what it would mean for them and their lives. Particular attention was paid here to full and supported consideration of the implications of ‘going public’ with their stories, including potential repercussions on mental health, employment, housing and relationships. The paced and structured process was also designed to help the women feel comfortable turning to the caseworkers for support throughout filming.
The caseworkers were on site throughout the filming process and stepped in to support the women when necessary. In our post-filming conversations, Power Play reflected on how difficult it was to anticipate the needs of the women as the process unfolded. They also noted that the women were drawn to one caseworker in particular, which meant that support was unequally offered in practice, creating more work for that caseworker. An experienced psychotherapist, Pamela Windham Stewart, who worked for many years with women in Holloway Prison, offered reflective sessions similar to clinical supervision to the caseworkers and to Power Play creative director Sophie and lead producer Polly, which were experienced as useful. Post-filming, Polly and Sophie reflected on the strain on the on-site casework and the need for more intensive support for the caseworkers. As the week unfolded, and therapeutic dimensions of the project became dominant, the caseworkers were integrated into the process in unexpected ways. This is described in the discussion of facilitation practices below. The caseworkers responded effectively to the women’s needs in the workshops as they emerged. If this shift towards the therapeutic and the expansion of the caseworkers’ roles had been pre-empted, more support could have been put in place for them.
In terms of the therapeutic offering to the women participating, two of the six women took advantage of the one-to-one therapy sessions. Three of the women were not interested in this therapy and one woman had her own therapeutic infrastructure in place. Another woman required additional support before, throughout and after the project – the process brought up painful and intense emotions and impacted her more deeply than she expected. She expressed a desire for more support, and the therapist also suggested that she would benefit from more sessions. Power Play used their contingency fund to provide more therapy sessions for this woman.
Though the support infrastructure was carefully thought through, Polly and Sophie reflected that – with the benefit of experience - they would have advertised through therapeutic channels as well as seeking caseworkers, asked an experienced practitioner to sit in on recruitment interviews, and set aside more budget for therapeutic support and aftercare. Though the workshops were not intended to be therapeutic spaces, as the facilitator stated during one workshop, the content of conversations and depth of emotion evoked through activities required therapeutic responses. A strength of this project was the flexibility and responsiveness of Polly and Sophie, the facilitator and the caseworkers.
Throughout the Support Plan document, there is attention to questions of pace and timing, acknowledging that the process – including re-entering the building, sharing stories, being on camera, and being with the other women and crew – might be overwhelming and stir up difficult memories and emotions for the women. The documents are insistent on slowness and building in space to gently acclimatise to the return to the prison, and to the process. However, this was challenged in various ways in practice and required responses and reconfigurations by Power Play during the filming period. For example, one challenge was the timekeeping of some of the women themselves, and the demands of the filming process, despite time being intentionally built in for slowness, reflection and check-ins with the women. This is further explored in the section 6.2. Sophie expressed regret that an additional preparatory online meeting - focused on creative process, with members of the steering committee with theatre and documentary expertise - did not take place as planned. She felt that this practical experience may have shifted their filming plans and expectations, particularly in relation to timekeeping. Yet, in practice, many of the dynamics and issues that arose would have been difficult to predict. Power Play were well prepared ahead of filming by conferring rigorously, listening and adapting their practice in response.
Polly and Sophie spoke compellingly in post-filming conversations about the learning and development of their practice throughout the process. Sophie recalled a key insight offered by a member of the steering committee, which significantly shaped her approach. This was the notion of reciprocity in working collaboratively and in trauma-informed ways. This advice encouraged an equalisation of the dynamic of observer and observed inherent to filmmaking. Power Play were mindful to respond openly and with their whole selves to the women, to reciprocate the truthful offerings by the women. The core team of fourPolly, Sophie, Daisy-May and Alice - came together for a reflective session a month before filming began, to talk through their apprehensions and elements of their personal histories that might inform their approach and responses to the project as it unfolded. This was described by Sophie as “the bedrock of the project” and a practice she hopes to undertake in every project going forward. Establishing this emotional and
honest connection among the core team ahead of the project felt “grounding and necessary.” It also laid the foundations for continuous check-ins with one another throughout the process.
5.2 Exploring the women’s expectations and preparing for filming
As explored in in section 6, there were tensions and challenges throughout the project between two not mutually exclusive but sometimes competing objectives: 1) the women’s healing and the therapeutic elements of the process and 2) the creation of a high quality and impactful documentary. This tension was pre-empted in the Power Play questionnaire circulated to the women ahead of filming, asking whether they were more interested in telling their personal stories, or highlighting the prison system’s failings. A note included alongside the question reassures the women that these are not mutually exclusive aims, that the personal, lived experience and the structural critique of the prison “can absolutely work together.” Power
Play’s effort to tease out these intertwined objectives - in order to more fully understand the women’s aims with the project - demonstrates a nuanced approach, alive to the subtleties of lived experience and personal politics. Though it was difficult to anticipate how the process would unfold, these preparatory conversations began the collective reflections necessary to inform decisions around the process and the framing of the project.
As reflected in our evaluation criteria, the women expected this duality of purpose: to tell their stories as part of a wider discussion on the impact of prisons and their place in society - “to use some of my story and personal experiences to more broadly highlight the way that prisons fail women.” They hoped to tell their stories to connect with and inspire other women, to empower and sustain them – “to be heard and for women to identify, to feel less alone… One woman gets help and changes. And it impacts a generation.” The women shared Power Play’s faith in storytelling as a method of transforming public perceptions about prisons and the imprisoned and hoped to mobilise their own stories and “testimony” to generate empathy, challenge stigma, to create solutions and to inspire - “it’s perhaps important to focus on personal experiences in order to convince the viewer that we need a different solution for the future.”
That said, the process was expected to be deeply personal, with the women hoping for closure, healing and a sense of safety, a hope that forms another of our evaluation criteria. Many spoke of wanting to connect with or “collect” their past selves, their inner child, their abandoned younger selves, the parts of them that died in Holloway Prison. There was some apprehension around the unpredictable and potentially intense emotional response to returning to the prison and participation in the workshops, with women emphasising the necessity of support infrastructure, careful communication and the risks of re-traumatisation through “re-enacting memories.” There was only so much that Power Play could ask the women to predict and expect ahead of entering the space and participating in the workshops – some of the challenges experienced by the women and Power Play’s responses are detailed below. Fielding the women’s ideas and concerns ahead of the project was essential, and this was comprehensively done in conversations as well as through the questionnaire. The challenge for Power Play was to manage complexity, hold moments of crisis and rebellion, and negotiate goals, motivations and emotions that transformed throughout the project. These transformations and tensions, and the potential for conflict that can arise in emotionally charged spaces, are acknowledged in the Ethical and Editorial Approach document, which states that:
“In the space, we know challenges will arise and accept this as part of the healing process that we won’t sanitize - but we’ll always prioritise safety over content. We’ll develop a process to assess when a situation goes from charged to unsafe.”
The Ethical and Editorial Approach document also acknowledges in its section on ‘tone’ that the workshops were likely to generate tension and demonstrates sensitivity to both negotiating and depicting those tensions and the need to hold space for emotions experienced and articulated by the women. The document attempts to set parameters around the unexpected, in activities, relationships and interactions with the space. A feminist faith in intuition is a guiding principle, and a responsiveness to the needs and desires of the women is centred: “Led by participants, but also exercising intuition, we will pull back from something that feels dangerous or flippant.” How some key tensions and challenges were addressed and resolved is explored in section 6.
Interview practices were also planned in thoughtful and trauma-informed ways, considering issues around language, the risks of re-traumatisation in questioning and how to minimise those risks, and how to ensure the women’s comfort – both physical and emotional. The women were prepared in many ways to feel at ease and ready for interviews. They were told in broad terms what kinds of questions would be posed, they were introduced to everyone on set ahead of filming, and they were shown their own image on screen ahead of the interview. Preparations were made to minimise distractions and disruption to the process, acknowledging that this is an important element of comfort and emotional safety, though some disruption was inevitable, for example the sound of passing airplanes and technical issues. The interview style developed by Power Play and supported in the moment by the crew, was a deliberate approach once again founded in Power Play’s trauma-informed practice. Issues that arose in interviews were handled with great care and compassion. Speaking in a post-project conversation, Sophie described how the interviews, questions and questioning style were led by curiosity and interest in the women’s experiences, rather than being primarily concerned with seeking information or identifying facts. There are moments throughout the interviews, however, where clarification is needed and requested of the women. When, for example, details of services or chronology of events is required to give a complete account.
In terms of women’s involvement in the creative and editorial process, the contract signed with the women states their right to review a cut of the film, to ensure that they do not feel misrepresented, that they are comfortable with the accuracy and fairness of the editing, and that safeguarding issues do not arise. Though the directors “want everyone to be proud of the film and their presentation,” the consultation will not include issues of appearance or preference. The existence of this contract was a bedrock of security that was returned to in moments of crisis. Mid-week, in a conversation with Lorraine, the facilitator, Sophie, the creative director, and Maria, one of the caseworkers, the women questioned the process and expressed discomfort about sharing their experiences and stories on camera, a pivotal moment that is discussed in detail in section 6.4. In this moment, the existence of this contract was relied upon to reassure the women -
the contract stipulations around editorial rights “are for you…you have editorial over this." In response to concerns that the editing might erase context or be reductive, the existence of the contract was central to a reassuring conversation, where the production team could explain the editing process, hold crucial conversations about trust, boundaries and consent, and emphasise the women’s ownership over the final film. The value of the women’s expertise was also emphasised in this moment as crucial to the editing process.
In our post-production conversation, Polly further reflected on the editorial process and the importance of being alert to the possibility that production and editorial decisions could unwittingly reproduce dominant narratives or tropes about women in prison. The documentary has several different audiences and serves different needs for different people. For some of the women healing and self-reflection was the primary motivation, for others advocacy and testimony. These distinct focuses, Polly commented, can lead to different documentary styles. An awareness of an eventual audience of the documentary who is not necessarily familiar with prisons meant that there was a need to ask the women for explanations of possible unfamiliar phrases such as ‘seg’, and to consider the visuals and aesthetics of certain shots. Polly was concerned that these considerations, as well documentary making conventions such as crew members remaining out of shot, might unwittingly and subtly lead to a particular documentary style that reproduces a certain dominant narrative. This possibility made the editorial control given to the women even more important.
The women were well compensated for their time – going beyond industry standards and in line with Power Play’s stated aims of challenging inequalities in the industry and valuing contributors. The women were paid Equity rates and will also receive a royalty of 2%. The women appreciated the valuing of their time and realistic assessment of their needs by offering payment at decent and transparent rates and royalties. One woman set this project in contrast with her previous experiences of feeling exploited and under-valued by institutions and media companies who claimed to understand her needs. These “tangible resources” set a tone of respect and understanding, leaving the women feeling that their input was valued.
Plans for distribution were also carefully considered and collaborative, aiming to work with the women to ensure that their voices are centred and that media strategies are designed with their needs in mind. This section of the Ethical and Editorial Approach document emphasises considered, trauma-informed preparation and a slow pace of response and reaction to potential issues and backlash.
5.3
Power Play’s attention to both emotional and material support, one woman stated, created a “solid blueprint” for those who hope to “work with and use the lived experiences of people from traumatic backgrounds.” The conversations ahead of filming were reassuring but even more so was observing Power Play’s work in practice – “they had thought about all the right things and were actively putting those things in place.” This thoughtful and proactive support, including the provision of caseworkers, was evidence of Power Play’s capacity to support and care for the women through the process “which is very important for people who come from our background.” Where the women struggled with digital documents, the directors adapted versions and ensured that the women were supported in accessing them. One woman felt the information was comprehensive but needed to ask a friend to go through the documents with her as she is dyslexic. The directors supported her by communicating on the phone as much as possible rather than relying on the written word. Where documentation was necessary – such as contracts – the directors, following the request of the woman in question, shared the information with her friend, who guided her through the paperwork.
The support from caseworkers was enormously valued by the women. Even if they did not access the therapeutic support sessions, their presence and interventions were reassuring and helped the women to feel safe, emotionally supported and cared for. It is clear from watching the rushes that their presence on set was important – when a woman was emotionally struggling, a caseworker was always on hand to sit with her. Therapeutic practices were deliberately built into the workshop sessions as the week progressed, led by one caseworker who joined in the sessions. It became clear, Polly and Sophie said in our post-filming conversations, that a therapeutic presence in the space would be an appropriate response to how the process was unfolding.
One woman acknowledged the limitations of what Power Play could offer in contrast to what she feels she needs – “what can they realistically do, they can't give you years of free therapy.” Though “obviously they can't take away all the trauma of that situation and everything that happened to you,” they offered a safe, supported space for the project. Another woman emphasised that there was personal work required to be able to accept support, including from the other women. The impact of the emotional potency of the experience on the capacity to accept the support is recognised by another woman, who commented that “it helped to know it was there,” even when she felt too overwhelmed to engage. Simple, supportive practices were put in place by the caseworkers - breathing exercises and holding space to be silent and to process. When this woman struggled with the emotional weight of the process, she did not feel pressured to engage but free to react the way she needed to. The continuity of therapeutic support provided to the women who
wanted it was seen as symbolic of the extent of care extended towards them. The entirety of the process was perceived as being caring, considered and supportive. One woman noted that the evaluation interviews also felt like a part of the supportive design of the project.
5.4 “I probably listened to their heart”: how the women experienced the process
In this section, we explore the women’s experiences of the project, from the preparation and support infrastructure put in place, to communications with Power Play, to the workshops and interview process. We draw on our interviews with the women and our analysis of the rushes, access to which gave us the opportunity to watch nearly full recordings of the filming process.
A key element of the project was Polly and Sophie’s caring and responsive communication style, which was acknowledged and valued by the women across the entire process from recruitment to filming to aftercare. In one particular moment of uncertainty and questioning - pivoting on the women’s discomfort about sharing in therapeutic mode on camera and discussed in more detail in section 6.4, Sophie unambiguously states that the women’s wellbeing would come first: "I would never want to create a situation where your needs are undercut by this process." The women felt cared for and understood, which was articulated as essential in this particular space, where – for many but not all – the experience was of distress, trauma and abandonment. Some of the women entered the project scarred from previous experiences with organisations and media workers, noting that these experiences were often extractive, not trauma-informed in practice, and left them feeling undervalued. We offer below some further examples of good, traumainformed practice in the HOLLOWAY project, describe how challenges were addressed and draw on our interviews with the women to analyse the process.
In our interviews, the women talked about the responsiveness, adaptability and support provided by Power Play. The women were drawn to the project because Polly and Sophie appeared genuine, truly invested in their wellbeing, and often aligned with the women’s own views on the prison system and its harms. They built trust with the women which was a vital foundation for the project. For some women, this was grounded in intuition and a sense of Polly and Sophie’s characters - humility and a lack of “pride, arrogance and self-righteousness.” For others it was based on Power Play’s stated principles and ethos as a company, which aligned with their own trauma-informed approach and socio-political beliefs. Polly and Sophie’s youth and passion were a mobilising force for one woman. Their enthusiasm and faith that the documentary could bring about positive change overcame her frustration at the system’s failures: “my attitude is nobody's listening and you just go do what you can do.” She was drawn to the project because of her interactions
with the Power Play team and a sense that there was something special about them and what they were doing:
“I didn't understand what it was, I didn't know how it was going to unfold or whatever. They was just so passionate about it… I think I listened to their heart. I think that's what I heard.”
Some women were initially apprehensive about taking part in the project because of previous experiences in other initiatives with criminalised women where their lived experience, and the lived experiences of others, was not valued. One woman raised her concerns straight away and felt reassured that Polly and Sophie were also asking these questions. She pushed them to consider:
“How trauma-informed is the team that's about to take on the weight of the stuff that, you know, women like myself have kept to ourselves for so long…how they're going to contain that and support us throughout that process.”
Some women’s personal experiences of other initiatives had taught them “how you can have your story taken over and you can lose control of your own narrative” which had instilled a fear about extraction and misrepresentation. Another woman was also concerned about misrepresentation, grounded in a protectiveness of Holloway and her frustration when the prison’s complexity and the actions of all officers were flattened into one narrative of violence and harm. She was concerned that the documentary would do the same, and during the process felt a responsibility to balance the narrative: “it's so important, you know, that the whole story is there, not just one thing.” Essential to women’s experience of the project was the trust carefully constructed by Power Play over a well-paced period of time, taking time to get to know the women and understand their perspectives, needs and motivations for taking part. The women had faith that the project would hold the complexity of their experiences of Holloway, and that their contributions would be honoured and represented with care.
Women described Polly and Sophie’s communication style and the frequency of communication off-set as “perfect.” Texts sent asking questions were answered immediately, recognising the women’s busy lives and often irregular working hours. The women’s anxieties about the process were eased through quick, responsive communication, and this communication style continued after the filming. The directors messaged and called the women to talk about how the process went and listened and responded to any concerns. The women reported ‘loads of conversations’ encouraging them to feel like the project was theirs. Sophie and Polly communicated carefully and consistently with the women, “checking in all the time” and built and sustained trusting and caring relationships:
“I think the heart of it is like the relationships that they built with us, you know? And not only have they taken time with the project, they've taken time to understand who I am, to understand my voice, my message, what I want to say. And they’ve really created a safe space for that to be valued throughout the whole process…I feel like I have a great relationship with them. I feel safe.”
Again, this was felt to be particularly important for women with experience of trauma and in the context of exploring the experience and impact of a dehumanising system. The preparation time helped them to feel “safer” and communication was key to avoiding fear of “going into something blind, blindsided.” Being heard – particularly being heard within that space – was important for the women. The trust built by Power Play ahead of filming facilitated this storytelling, as did the women’s trust in the “powerhouse” facilitator, Lorraine, who was trusted to tactfully pose questions and contain the emotions that emerged. The allfemale or non-binary crew were described as “warm” and “kind” and “kind of just got it,” which meant that the women could “feel a bit less kind of on guard” and trust them with their stories and experiences:
“Having the trust with the crew as well, you know, I mean, they believed in me and me believing in them to be able to sort of tell them my story and my experience during that moment …I feel like that bit was very powerful because at that time, when I was there in that seg room, you're not really heard. But this was the time to sort of voice that.”
5.5 The filming and workshop process: communication, care and grounding
In this section, we reflect on the trauma-informed and caring practice demonstrated during the process, acknowledging good practice and noting challenges and how they were addressed. The Power Play team navigated complex issues throughout the period of filming: varied emotional responses; trauma-related reactions to the process; logistical and technical issues and their impact on the women; and practical issues related to the hot weather and Covid restrictions, which also carried emotional significance. For some of the women, being treated with care and compassion during filming felt both jarring and meaningful as a stark contrast to how they were previously treated in that building. However, being in that space also meant that a particular dynamic was easy to reproduce. As Polly reflected, roles were “primed” for the women as former prisoners to be again subject to control and restrictions and for the Power Play team to be viewed as figures of authority. The process required risk assessments, health and safety checks, form-filling and imposing order on women’s time, movement and actions in the space, especially considering Covid-19 restrictions. The time-sensitive demands of filming - after negotiating time in Holloway with the developers of the site - also set a pace for the project that needed to be adhered to by Power Play. It was clear that Polly and Sophie were aware of the potential for a trauma-triggering reproduction of roles, and worked hard
to undo this with kindness, communication and taking the women’s lead with filming, for example asking what parts of the prison they wanted to visit and what they would like to do there. When asking the women for feedback and inviting them to suggest alterations to filming and scheduling, the communication was unambiguous: "it needs to be what you need. What is necessary. Genuinely." When posing questions to the women, the possibility of refusal, of saying no, was emphasised.
Being back in the prison building – many for the first time - and being there for an extended period, gave the women space and time to reflect on and connect with their own experiences. Returning to the prison was emotionally intense and laden with memory. It was clear from the rushes and interviews that the experience was visceral and overwhelming for some of the women, while others reacted with curiosity, playfully reclaiming the space and reminiscing about their time there. Being in the prison, walking around and exploring often painful and difficult memories brought up challenging emotions and generative insights. The power of the process was for the women to be there, with time to reflect on their experiences. The directors navigated the complexity of these experiences with enormous tact, gentleness and responsiveness. Mid-way through the week of filming, in a moment of collective re-examination of the process, discussed in more detail in section 6.4, the facilitator, Lorraine, recognised that being back in the prison space could throw up unexpected things. She observed that the women had "been able to think about yourself, outside of other people" and that their goals for the process may have changed as a result. Moments of reflection and recalibration were essential and responsive to the women’s needs as they arose and underlined the women’s agency throughout. The key points discussed here relate to: the caring, gentle and responsive interview and facilitation style; breathing and grounding exercises integrated into the process; clear communication; and a response to women’s concerns that was honest, validating and open.
5.6 Reception into the prison
From the first day of filming, the Power Play team and facilitator set a tone of togetherness and care, taking time to create a circle to introduce the women to the entire team. After a formal introduction and grounding exercise, the women were led on a dynamic walk around the prison site. The format allowed for a slow reception into the process, allowing women time to acclimatise to being in the prison and to get to know one another a little. There were immediate challenges however. The women arrived in a staggered way, leading to extended periods of waiting which required facilitation work, warmth and patience from the team and the women themselves. The intention behind this was to document each women’s individual reaction to the return but it also created a challenging space for the women who had already arrived and were waiting to start the day. There was a stilted time where introductions and questions were put on pause. The facilitator and Power Play team worked with the group to create a more relaxed atmosphere
that could hold the tension the differing timings created – there was gentle conversation, the women were asked how they were, but there was also a need to delay answering questions or starting full introductions until the whole group had arrived. In this period, in the reception yard, there was time to respond to the women’s varied reactions, described in section 5.6, as they arrived one by one. The facilitator held the space in a warm and welcoming manner, however, the combination of the uncertainty inherent to the first day of filming, the gathering of women who did not all know one another, and the intensity of the return to the prison for the first time, meant that this felt like a difficult moment.
Another challenge related to the women’s experience of being on camera immediately on arrival. In an interview, one woman said that this felt intense and that she felt unprepared to be filmed immediately. Her first moments of return to the prison were emotional and overwhelming, and to be filmed for the first time simultaneously “was a lot to come at one time.” She suggested that Power Play could have spent some preparatory time with each woman ahead of the formal start of filming, to allow them to get used to being on camera. As will be explored in section 6.5, the women’s awareness of the cameras, and discomfort with their presence particularly in times of heightened emotion, was an issue that was aired throughout the week.
A beautiful and personal token of care - incorporated as an idea from theatre company Clean Break – was the preparation of a wellbeing pack for each woman. Gifted on the first morning of filming in the prison, the pack included essential oils as grounding smells, a stress ball, tissues and a bottle of water. The pack was offered as a demonstration of care and Sophie and Polly felt that they were practically useful. The women used the oils to ground themselves, and tissues were sought and passed around.
5.7 Breathing and grounding exercises
As the women arrived into the prison, some had a strong reaction to entering the space. This was manifest in silence and withdrawal, disorientation, agitated breathing, and other physical experiences linked to emotional overwhelm. The immediate reaction to these responses was for the facilitator to talk the woman through a breathing exercise. The women reacted well to this intervention and the facilitator’s experience was evident in her calm and reassuring demeanour. Again, the other women – especially those with preexisting relationships – soothed one another with physical touch and reassurances that the gates are now open. Moments such as this were also used by the women to reflect on social and personal circumstances that offered perspective, reflections on healing and personal trajectory, and a reminder of their purpose in the space. Many women in society, one woman said, are not given the space and support to breathe that was available to the women on set.
After welcoming the women and filming introductions, and before beginning a collective walk around the prison grounds, Lorraine, the facilitator, led a grounding and breathing exercise. The women sat in a circle as
she talked through some simple and gentle instructions that seemed to set a calm and settled tone. Throughout the week, in the forum theatre workshops, similar exercises were led by Lorraine and Maria, one of the caseworkers. Each day of the workshops was structured carefully to allow for grounding, connection and play, in order to establish a sense of connection to one another and a sense of safety. Laughter and play were enormously important to the process - this was generated through games and exercises led by Lorraine, and the humour brought into the room by the women themselves. The games were often also exercises in themselves, designed to demonstrate an idea to work with in the process There were also numerous calming and connecting exercises which worked well to settle the women’s energy and to bring their awareness to their bodies and breathing. Maria used a simple and beautiful framework when leading grounding exercises, encouraging the women to acknowledge and connect with the wordless stories in their bodies. Doing these regular grounding activities established a therapeutic and caring rhythm around the workshops. Often, the women were explicitly asked whether they wanted to do a grounding exercise, or to play a connecting or ice-breaking game. Though guided by Lorraine and Maria, there was a sense throughout that the women were being listened to, that their needs were explored and responded to.
The women’s needs at each moment were varied and changeable and the facilitator and wider production team had to work hard to respond and attempt to meet them. For example, asking the women to do exercises as pairs or in a group was an attempt to build connection, but one woman articulated her unease with working in this way, that she did not feel safe in a group. The women expressed a need for structure and clarity around timings, but later in the week also expressed a need for there to be flexibility in how the workshops were wound up. Some women - early in the week - talked about the process not feeling emotional at all, while others had to leave the circle to gather themselves at the very same moment. These differences in approach and experience were a lot to navigate and the production team responded with honesty, clarity and adaptations to the process.
5.8 Memory walks
Pre-existing relationships were honoured and became part of the supportive dynamic of the filming process. Two pairs of women had pre-existing friendships from their time in the prison system, and there were moving scenes of being reunited. These pre-existing relationships generated energetic and personal conversation about shared memories, both in the initial collective walk around the prison, and the “memory walks” which they did in pairs. Two of the women expressed a desire to be filmed on these memory walks together and Power Play not only adapted their plans to allow this but also asked the other pair of friends if they would like to do the same. Polly and Sophie recognised that this was valuable not only in terms of the women’s comfort and sense of being in control of the process, but also in how it generated natural
conversations that flowed between friends. They also commented that the women walking round the prison in pairs had the benefit of creating more time in the schedule for these walks. During these shared walks the conversations were often funny and light-hearted as the women told one another stories and shared memories. Conversations also illustrated how close trauma is to the surface, as conversations could suddenly become serious and distressing.
During the walks, Sophie gently and tactfully asked some questions and occasionally prompted the direction of the conversation and the women’s movement through the prison. However, despite some gentle interventions and guidance, the women were explicitly asked where they would like to walk and what they would like to see; the conversations and exploration of the building was directed by the women. The women were compassionate, understanding and trusting – they listened deeply to one another, asked questions about their experiences and shared memories in an open, personal and generous way. They re-mapped the space together, pooling memories and making sense of their experiences. They hugged and comforted one another, offering reassurances: “we’re free now.” One woman spoke about how different it felt to be in that space with a friend. Walking around the prison together prompted storytelling in a natural, intimate and often harrowing way, as the women remembered and recalled incidents that they experienced or saw.
In the individual memory walks, the dynamic was very different. Questions from Sophie were needed to prompt a narrative from the women about how they were experiencing the space and what memories were emerging. It felt more personal and reflective and had the potential to feel, and at times felt, intrusive, especially when it was clear that the woman was unsettled by the experience. That said, the dynamic may also have been set by the woman herself and her emotional reaction, and the choice to walk alone or in company and conversation may have reflected the needs and expectations of the women in their encounter with the space. The facilitation of these walks was gentle, calm and caring, as were the questions asked. The memory walks were generative and informative, and offered the women the opportunity to explore – and perhaps reclaim - the space. For us, the effectiveness and ethical standard of this method was achieved through how Power Play shaped the experience – with tactful and personal questioning and a caring and responsive approach.
6 Tensions and challenges in
In the following section we identify and discuss some significant moments of tension and challenge across the process, considering how the trauma-informed foundations of the project and approach equipped the Power Play team, the facilitator, the therapists, and the women to respond to these. Some of these challenges emerged from tensions between competing priorities and purposes that emerged from the demands of making a documentary and the women’s own expectations and intentions for participating in the project. In their conversations with us both Sophie and Polly emphasised a commitment to prioritising the women’s comfort and experience over any directorial or artistic decisions or preferences, echoing the foundational principles outlined in the project documents. This commitment to the women’s wellbeing and to allowing the women to direct the process was evident throughout. Some examples have already been shared here, however, as we will describe, this also created the challenge of managing multiple priorities and expectations and recognising the limits of what can be offered or forgone in terms of the demands of filming or the documentary process.
Reflecting on a series of moments, this section explores several challenges and tensions identified through the evaluation. These include a tension between women’s autonomy and moments of direction; the impact of timing and scheduling issues on the group; the challenge of ensuring the women had a grounded and present experience, whilst also documenting material for an audience; and the women’s experience of healing as well as advocating for others. As noted, these challenges and tensions were considered by Power Play in the foundational documents and highlighted in the pre-production questionnaire shared with the women.
6.1 Autonomy versus direction
As discussed in section 4.2, the return to the space was anticipated by several of the women to be part of a process of healing and reclaiming, providing the first criteria for evaluation - ‘healing and transforming personal narratives.’ Ensuring that the women could direct their journey around the building in the memory walks was a critical aspect of creating the conditions for this healing to occur. As described, the women’s walk around the site, either alone or in pairs, was not choreographed or directed by Power Play. It was vital, given the sensitivity and significance of returning to the building, that the women were able to tell their own story through the space, and to remap and create new narratives where they were previously incarcerated. This was important to ensure the women were able to fulfil their hopes and expectations for participating in the project; two of the women discussed wanting to return to the building and to their old cells as key
motivations for taking part. A return to the physicality of the building, to see what remained and what had changed, was a vital and often overwhelming part of the experience of all the women. For another woman, who described the nightmares she still had about being in her cell, returning to the building to see it in a state of disrepair was part of the process of removing the power it had over her, to create new memories in the space that she had now entered freely and where she could exercise control and autonomy.
During the memory walks, the camera crew followed the women as they explored the building, often searching for significant places - old cells but also windows they would stand at to wave to family and friends outside prison walls, or the old hairdressing room to see if it was still painted the same colour. The crew often kept a physical distance, following a few paces behind and being led by the women to the areas of the prison important to them. The walks were given time and space and achieved remarkable results; as the women narrated their exploration of the prison, retracing steps and telling stories, they brought the dilapidated building to life. Memories of the busyness and noise of the building became tangible through the women’s words: “We would shout from each end. Bang on the window. See if she’s there”. This approach of asking the women to lead the walks and seeing what memories emerged, rather than having a set schedule of places to visits, also meant that space was held for uncertainty, confusion and incomplete memories. Two women walking together, for example, had a gentle disagreement about which floor they were on and remapped the space together through their conversations. Another woman described feeling disorientated and unsure of her own memory when looking for her old cell because of how different it looked. As she reflected on how she remembered the ceilings being higher she asked, “was I tiny?”, to which her companion replied, “you were a baby”. Moments such as these, where the women’s past experiences were felt so vividly in the present, were made possible by affording the women as much control and autonomy in the space as possible, giving the time and space to reflect on their experience of Holloway then and now.
There were times, however, that the demands of filming conflicted with the women’s exploration of the building. As Polly discussed in her post-production conversation with us, time pressures for filming, access to the site and the restrictions presented by the building itself (narrow corridors and confined spaces) meant there were limitations to the amount of time that could be given to the memory walks, with a planned filming schedule and plans for the content that they wanted to capture for the documentary. This inevitably created tensions between the demands of the documentary and the needs of the women. Power Play were very aware of and managed this tension sensitively with careful redirection, and always with the wellbeing of the women taking priority. For example, after two of the women spent some time trying to get their bearings, looking out of windows and trying to identify which wing they were on and where they wanted to
go, they were gently redirected by Sophie who clarified “so back to A (wing) and then down?” in order to refocus the conversation and movement around the building The demands of the filming schedule were recognised, and to some extent prioritised, but in ways that supported, acknowledged and validated the women’s experience of exploring the building. These moments highlight the limits of allowing complete control and agency in the walks around the building due to the very present logistical and time pressures the team were under.
Timing constraints were felt by the women; each of the women who took part in post-production interviews described wanting more time to explore the building and return to old cells. On woman commented that she had a different story to tell in each cell she had been in, and the time limits meant she was not able to return to each. The women expressed an awareness and understanding of the timing and budget constraints, but nonetheless noted a desire for more time to explore and tell their stories. The atmosphere of support, trust and flexibility that Power Play fostered meant that they did as much as possible to ensure the women could explore the building as they wished, lead the exploration and control the narrative. Inevitable pressures and limitations meant this was not always possible to the extent the women hoped. There were instances, however, where the women prioritised their own needs despite an awareness of timing constraints; one woman commented on how she went to find her old cell, despite knowing that it would make her late for the workshops. She “needed to see the place empty. You feel awkward because you don’t want to mess up the filming, but I really need to go and do this thing. I’m sorry”. In our postproduction conversation, Sophie expressed hope that the women felt able to challenge the process and their decisions. This woman’s decision to find her cell despite the impact on the schedule demonstrated that Power Play successfully fostered an empowering process that centred the women’s agency, creating an environment where they felt able to take control despite awareness of the production’s competing demands.
6.2 Managing timing and schedules
As discussed, the production had a schedule determined by various factors, including access to the building, content that needed to be captured and the different stages of the project. These factors inevitably placed pressures on timing. This created challenges for the workshops, where the women often arrived at different times, for varying reasons. Late arrivals impacted on the character and atmosphere of the space; this was particularly palpable at times when it caused a delay to the start of activities. This was managed through careful facilitation, the responses of the other women, and practical support offered to the women arriving later. Lorraine, the workshop facilitator, used gentle welcomes and breathing/grounding exercises to
maintain or establish a safe and contained environment for those waiting, and restated the directions for activities where necessary. At other times, the women themselves found ways to manage the atmosphere. In particular, humour was often used to diffuse tension and shape the character of the space. The Power Play team also provided logistical support such as arranging taxis and other help with travel arrangements. In combination, this had the effect of recognising the disruption but working collectively and with traumainformed generosity to manage it. On one occasion, humour was used by the group to diffuse agitation that lateness started to create, and Lorraine adapted the schedule so that those present could begin an activity. In a later whole group exchange about timekeeping, jokes were used to bring a lightness to the issue, coupled with a recognition that some women were consistently on time and therefore most impacted. Across the week, as the group become more cohesive and connected, there were more instances of the group shaping and managing the space and the tensions that could arise in it.
In our conversation, Polly noted that timing issues were difficult to navigate; the team were conscious of needing to keep to the planned schedule, aware of the frustrations that timing issues could cause and of disruption to the process. The waiting around, Polly noted, meant that the filming experience was more akin to a motion picture film than a documentary and this created challenges for the women, combined with Covid-19 measures that created rules reminiscent of being in the prison. Throughout, there was recognition by Power Play of the magnitude of the experience and return to the building and how this impacted some of the women’s timekeeping. This was confirmed by one of the women in our post-filming interview. She described how the emotional weight of the experience meant that she was at times uncertain about continuing with the process and this was reflected in struggles with timekeeping and difficulties engaging with the workshops. The trauma-informed approach of the Power Play team meant that timekeeping issues were approached with care and understanding as a possible trauma response.
6.3 Disorientation and freedom
There were many moments in the memory walks where the power of the building and the experience of being incarcerated there came to the fore. Many of the women asked if they were allowed to enter certain spaces, and the disorientation that came from walking around the now-empty building meant that there were moments of not being fully in control of the engagement with the space. For example, one woman asked of a closed door: “Am I allowed to open it? I have no idea where I am”. Another reflected on how the experience of always been led around, of following and going wherever one was taken, meant that she paid little attention to the building when she was imprisoned there. Her experience of navigating the space on her return was one of confusion and disorientation “it’s so disorientating, I’ve got no clue”. Allowing the
women freedom to direct their own exploration of the space, therefore, was vital to countering what for some was a return to feelings of being restricted in their movement around the building. One of the women, for example, stopped in a hallway and reflected on how busy and hectic it was, how she would not have been allowed to stop and talk in this spot, but would have been moved on. The experience of standing still and talking with a friend felt strange and promoted a reflection on the restrictions on the women’s movements, relationships and activities at every level whilst imprisoned.
It was vital, therefore, that minimal restrictions or direction were placed on the women’s return to the building, how they moved around it, which parts of the building they explored and at what pace. This would have impeded the possibility of a return being experienced as empowering for the women, or the possibility of creating a different kind of relationship to the space. The Power Play team had an acute awareness that the women were primed for the role of “prisoner” in the space and were particularly attentive to ensuring they had freedom and control in their movement around it. There were frequent and gentle reminders of this during the interviews and memory walks - that the women were free and could direct their own movements. For example, in this exchange during a memory walk, a woman reminds herself of this, and is affirmed by Sophie:
Woman: “Now I’m here, I can just walk out freely. No one’s telling me nothing. I have my own freedom, and no one can tell me what to do”
Sophie: “You can go anywhere you want right now”
As the week progressed and the women got to know one another and the Power Play team, they seemed more comfortable with being in the space and assured of their position as free women in a disused prison. This is evident in the increased use of humour to comment on their previous positions of “prisoner” and highlighting the difference between their experience of the space then and now. On the final day, the group walked in the prison grounds and at one point were asked by crew members to stop and wait for the camera to catch up and to adjust position for the sound. The women laughed and joked as they waited, making comments about being sent to seg if they fall out of line. Again, this moment highlighted how the women’s experience is always framed by the setting of the prison and this is particularly visible in moments where the women require direction or redirection for filming purposes. The recognition of this by Power Play from the outset meant that the women were able to express autonomy in this moment, by joking about and drawing attention to the symbolism of being directed in the prison. Despite the awareness of the roles
that the women are primed for in their return, and the trauma-informed efforts to transform these roles, for some of the women aspects of the process did echo and reinforce the experience of the institution itself. For one woman, the workshops themselves felt systematic and frustrating. She found that whilst they were useful for containing the conversation, the structure of the workshops reflected the prison system and felt institutionalised. The incorporation of therapeutic exercises during the day were essential for this woman to continue with the process.
6.4 Trust and mistrust in the process
Trust in the process and in Polly and Sophie particularly, was crucial for the women to feel fully engaged and safe participating. As discussed, the enthusiasm, values and practice that the women saw from Polly and Sophie was key for ongoing participation. It was perhaps inevitable and necessary that this trust was tested at some point during the process. This happen on the third day of filming the workshops and was a pivotal moment in the process, one that demonstrated the importance of the trauma-informed foundations of the project. On this day, Lorraine the facilitator introduced the workshop theme – survival – and one woman asked for time to work on this off-camera, explaining they wanted to share experiences but not for them to be recorded. Lorraine explained that it was unlikely for there to be time for an off-camera discussion, reminding them that the project is about sharing experiences but that the women have ownership over what will be included in the film. This did not provide full reassurance – “no comment” was one woman’s response – and a group conversation with Sophie (in person) and Polly (on speaker phone) followed.
Sophie and Polly were fully involved and engaged in the conversation; they approached it with openness and willingness to listen and to make changes. They returned to the review process, reminding the women that they have ownership over what is included in the final cut and carefully explain why an off-camera space is not possible. Whilst the women were not initially offered the off-camera time they requested, what followed was a careful renegotiation of boundaries and expectations for the workshops as the group collectively agreed steps that would provide an increased feeling of safety for the women. Throughout this conversation there was regular checking in from Lorraine, Maria the therapist and from Sophie and Polly. They articulated acknowledgment how much the women are giving to the process, the artificial nature of having these conversations with “cameras in your face”, and the absolute centring of their experience and wellbeing – “I would never want to create a situation where your needs are undercut by this process,” Sophie told the group. This sentiment was later re-stated by Lorraine - “I am here to facilitate what you want to bring, not the other way around”. Maria gently opened a conversation about group safety and the implications of speaking off camera for other members of the group when everyone was sharing stories.
Some very tangible suggestions were made as a result of the conversation, using a whiteboard to note down ideas that the group or individual might want to return to. Points raised related to a more detailed explanation of the editing process and the reasons for keeping everything on-camera, clarity on the themes and timings of the workshops, and a more grounded ending to the day. Maria the therapist then suggested holding a more therapeutic conversation, acknowledging that “it will push us back, but it will help us to respond to what we've got in the room at the moment.” Here the timings and schedules were relinquished to meet the needs of the women in the moment. This conversation could take place off-camera if it is needed, said Sophie - “It needs to be what you need. What is necessary. Genuinely”. In this moment, Power Play demonstrated their commitment to their key principle of centring and prioritising the women’s needs over and above the demands of filming, but this is done through a process of conversation, negotiation and exploring alternatives. Following the conversation, which worked to re-establish trust in the team and process, the group agreed that the conversation could be on camera, given that they have editorial control: “we signed up to this,” one of the women comments. The therapeutic conversation went ahead in this way and honoured a request from one woman that she did not want cameras “running up on me” and for the cameras to “stay out of the circle and out of the way”. This newly negotiated way of working was a departure from the planned schedule for therapeutic purposes and what followed was an incredibly powerful reflection on the women’s experience of speaking and sharing stories in the space. The day ended with games, sharing, and laughter – activities that were enormously important to the workshop process throughout. The process of listening and responding to the women’s needs, acknowledging the sometime tension between their needs and the requirements of filming, and not taking the women’s trust and feelings of safety for granted, resulted in a stronger collective project that held the women at its centre.
In the post-workshop interviews, it was clear that this day and conversation was an important moment for the group. One woman commented on this moment as when the group started to doubt the production team and question whether they could be trusted. She described the way they listened and accepted the groups concerns, without taking the criticism personally. This was incredibly important for a group of women who have experienced trauma, she commented, and have not been heard or listened to. Sophie also reflected on this as a pivotal point in the process and one that demonstrated the importance of the traumainformed approach. This moment confirmed that the women did feel able to challenge and contest the process as the team had hoped.
6.5 Being present v documenting material
The process needed to manage a tension between creating the conditions for the women to experience the return fully and remain present and grounded in the moment and to simultaneously document experiences as content for the documentary.
The need to gather content for the documentary meant that women were asked to retell stories, and sometimes interrupted because of sound or lighting issues. On one memory walk, for example, two of the women talked about the vulnerability associated with maintaining personal hygiene in the prison, including their experiences of showering. Following a few minutes of discussion where both women recalled intimate, vulnerable and exposing experiences, they were asked to recreate the conversation for the camera. This created some awkwardness and removed the spontaneity and naturalness of this intimate and vulnerable conversation. The relationships between the women, and the relationships Power Play established with them, allowed this awkwardness and interruption to exist without derailing the entire process. There
remained, however, an awareness of the tension between the women having an authentic experience in the present, where they could have unrehearsed conversations, and the need to recreate these experiences for the purpose of recording. These moments of tension could not be eliminated, but in the context of the trauma-informed, careful and attentive process that Power Play created, in collaboration with the women taking part, it was made manageable.
The tension between being present and documenting material was most apparent when technical or environmental issues interrupted filming. For example, the interviews filmed outdoors were sometimes paused because of passing traffic, aeroplanes or other environmental noises and the women being interviewed were interrupted in the middle of an important part of their story. These interruptions were met at different times with confusion, laughter, and at one point concern from one interviewee that the interruption was her own fault. Sophie always responded in a way that was testament to the relationship Power Play built with each of the women. She knew when to respond with humour, reassurance, or acknowledgement of the strangeness the interruptions created, and offered a fuller break or refreshments. For example, following repeated interruptions due to a helicopter overhead, Sophie asked “How are you doing? I know it’s weird, the stop-start. Are you alright? Need some water?” Later in the same interview, as the woman expressed concern that she had caused an interruption, came the following exchange:
Sophie: “It’s never your fault”
Interviewee: “I’m probably forgetting because I’m here – this is where we get in trouble.”
This exchange was still framed by light-hearted humour and gentle laughter from both interviewer and interviewee but offered reassurance as well as acknowledgment of the impact of returning to the prison. This recognition of how even minor instances in this space can be experienced as punitive was vital to understanding how to respond with sensitivity and care in these moments of disruption. Sophie and the crew used care, humour, and recognition of the whole person as a way of making the strangeness of the experience more manageable, and to prioritise the women’s wellbeing and experience in these moments where it was necessary to interrupt or disrupt the women’s accounts in order to get the content required.
These kinds of interruptions felt more disruptive and difficult to respond to when they occurred during the workshops. For example, on the first day of the workshops, the crew interrupted the introduction of the therapist to the group to change the seating configuration, in order to ensure the lighting and camera angles were optimal for filming. Again, a few moments later, the beginning of a group exercise was interrupted for
filming purposes. Perhaps because of the already differing energy levels and dynamics in the room during the workshops, the technical interruptions felt more difficult to resolve. The energy during the workshops was very changeable throughout and shifts could be felt in response to seemingly small instances. However, as described elsewhere, the skills of the therapists and facilitator in the room, as well as the support offered by the women to one other, allowed the group to recalibrate and find a balance and ways of working together.
One of the barriers to remaining present and grounded in the moment was the presence of the cameras and the fact that the women were being filmed. On the first day of filming the workshops, this tension emerged immediately when the women walked into the room and found they were already being filmed. “What’s going on? Is the camera filming as soon as we walk in? This is mad”, one reacted. Another reacted with a rush of questions - “Are you guys just going to hold the cameras? Are we going to do activities? Oh my god, when are we starting?” Both these comments reveal the impact of being filmed and the importance of communicating the details of the process to the women. The set up and operation of a set is likely to be unfamiliar and possibly experienced as confusing and intrusive to someone who is new to it. As mentioned earlier, one of the women in a post-workshop interview commented on how overwhelming it felt to be filmed from the moment of stepping back through the gates. She suggested that having time to get used to the cameras would help with this. Whilst for those familiar or comfortable with being filmed the cameras may have felt less intrusive, those more unfamiliar with being filmed struggled to remain in the present and found the experience more challenging. The unexpected presence of the cameras in this instance was distracting and unsettling for the women and suggested that more consideration could have been given to how the presence of the cameras and schedule of filming was explained and reiterated to the women. Following this discussion, the facilitator used a grounding breathing exercise that asked the women to imagine a safe space, thinking about how this felt in their body. Lorraine said during the exercise:
“Today you have power to make anything possible, you are in charge of every movement that you make, you can change anything you want to, in this moment there is not going to be anyone else around” .
Through the breathing exercise, Lorraine attempted to create a moment of safety and containment that counteracted the uncertainty and confusion created by the presence of cameras. It is an example of how breathing exercises were used to manage the tension between being present in the experience and being aware of or observing the self in the process of making the documentary.
At other times, the women themselves prioritised advocacy or capturing content over a grounded experience in the present. For example, whilst exploring the building, several of the women used their phones to record and take photographs of their experience. When watching the rushes, this felt potentially disruptive and distracting, taking the women’s focus away from the moment and towards curating a narrative for a different audience. Polly explained the decision not to ask the women not to use their phones on set, reflecting that Power Play wanted the women to freely explore the building in the ways they wanted to, and that this afforded the women agency. It also generated additional footage of the space curated by the women. Where the women posted footage on social media, Polly reflected on how this also shared the experience with a wider community of people and was important for the women who were taking part in the project as advocates for others, while also considering privacy and permissions for recording each other.
In a later example, during the workshops, it was one of the women who wanted to talk in detail about things she felt important to be captured on film. The facilitator slowed her down and brought her and the group back to a grounding exercise they did at the beginning and end of every session. In this instance, humour was used to manage this moment as the conflicting or competing aims were recognised, and then gently realigned. These tensions were inevitable in an environment and process that held so many different aims and objectives, histories and feelings that relate to and shape the return to the prison. The hopes and expectations that the women had for the process at times created conflict or competing objectives for the women themselves, where “healing and transforming personal narratives”, for example, might require a slower and more contemplative engagement than the energy required to “give voice to others”.
Here we return to our evaluation criteria and questions to consider how well the project met the hopes and motivations of the participants and Power Play’s core aims as detailed in the Ethical and Editorial Approach document. See section 4.2 for the evaluation criteria in full
• Did the return to Holloway and participation in the Power Play project create opportunities for healing and transforming personal narratives?
Following the completion of the project, the women described an emotionally challenging and often unexpected experience. Relationships with other women were particularly transformative, with one woman reflecting that being with others with similar experiences made it possible to share personal stories. The project provided the women with opportunities to reflect on their personal journeys and create explanatory narratives for what happened to them. Each of the women described a process of healing and transformation, although this occurred in different ways and to a different extent for everyone. For one woman the intensity of the experience led her to disconnect from the process until later in the project and through engaging with the therapeutic support. For another woman, returning to the prison helped her to build new memories and reclaim her power through telling her story. She described: “I feel like the growth within myself has just been such an amazing journey from when I was last there. I can now explain it…Now I have the power”.
Opportunities to return to cells and other places of significance were incorporated into the project and the importance of this recognised by the team. The women were supported to consider the impact of returning to the cells ahead of time and, as one woman described, she was helped to “manage her expectations” about how she might feel. There were some frustrations with this part of process; the memory walks and return to cells were particularly important, but some women reported not having enough time to tell their stories fully. In addition, the cameras were at different times experienced as intrusive, awkward and overwhelming and this impacted significantly on the opportunities for healing for some of the women, at times acting as a barrier to being fully present. But in line with their core aim to “share, not extract,” Power Play listened and responded to the women’s concerns about this by - for example - keeping cameras at a distance during breaks.
The workshops created space for emotional connection with the prison and experiences of imprisonment in ways that were often more intense than anticipated. The workshops were experienced in different ways by each of the women. For one woman, there was an element of fun and entertainment, but she felt they took up too much time and did not leave space for speaking about experiences in detail. For others, the
workshops reproduced institutional experiences and felt systematic and frustrating. In these instances, the therapeutic element of the process and the grounding and breathing exercises were essential for creating and managing this emotional response. For others, whilst there was some initial uncertainty and confusion about the process, the workshops provided space to think, speak, connect with experiences and have powerful realisations about their stories.
Power Play, through its foundational documents and practices, succeeded in creating a safe, inclusive and trauma-informed process that made space for complex emotions to be explored. Trauma-informed practice was written into the foundations of the project, evidenced by the code-of-conduct and the core aim to be trauma-informed, compassionate and real throughout. This was implemented in various ways, including: clear and accessible communication; a responsive, flexible practice; affording autonomy, control and respect to all; considering pace and timing and incorporating frequent breaks and grounding exercises; ensuring therapeutic support was available before, during and after production; hiring only women and non-binary crew members; providing hot food, taking individualised requests; providing care packages at the start of filming; and understanding the women’s capacity to engage with the process through a trauma-informed lens. The openness to fair and open pathways for decision-making and accountability, another core aim, was met when production decisions were challenged and questioned. This flexibility and willingness to listen and change without defensiveness was another layer of trauma-informed practice. Whilst these strategies, and others, could not wholly prevent or eliminate the possibility of emotional distress or of being retraumatised, the women reported their importance throughout the process. As one woman described, the Power Play team created a “beautiful blueprint” for other projects to replicate when working with individuals with trauma.
• Did the process give women the opportunity to be part of and contribute to the retelling of the history of Holloway?
The project was seen to have historical significance and for some of the women this was an important motivation for participating. An important part of this was providing space, time and respect to each account of Holloway, even in their diversity and difference. This was achieved in part by affording the women autonomy in their movement around the building, including whether to do so alone or together, and to direct the interview narrative. The women recording and photographing their walk around the building on phones, sometimes with social media content in mind, also meant they were contributing their own narrative and history of the building for their own audiences. The differences in individual experiences of Holloway became more apparent in the workshops. One woman was particularly concerned about how Holloway’s history might be told, but there was space for narratives to be challenged and contested through
conversation and for factual inaccuracies to be corrected. Often, this was done through one-to-one conversations between the women.
The ethical and editorial approach recognised that there would be different accounts of Holloway and its history and anticipated the tensions that might arise in the workshops. In this way there was consideration given to how diverging accounts of Holloway would be incorporated into the process. Power Play reflected on how filming, interview and editorial approaches can produce narratives that reinforce dominant tropes or flatten out complexities. At this stage it is difficult to assess how this will be managed and achieved in the final documentary, but giving women input at the editorial stages means there is a reduced risk of certain histories and experiences being mis- or unrepresented in the final film.
The women were given space and time to return to the building as a historic event in and of itself, although, as discussed, this was subject to time limitations and rarely happened without being filmed. However, on the final night, everyone gathered at the swimming pool and shared stories until the building closed at 11pm. This was, for one woman, the most powerful part of the process and provided the “perfect ending.” A final filmed closing ceremony also recognised how historically significant the return to the building was by gathering the group at a tree in the grounds and inviting them to wrap ribbons around the tree in the suffragette colours and to remember all the women who came through Holloway before them. This ceremony honoured the lived experiences of the six women taking part in the project, and situated their stories in the long history of women imprisoned in Holloway.
• Were the women able to give voice to others and advocate for women in prison?
The women were given the opportunity to speak as advocates and give voice to the experience of imprisonment through and beyond their own specific experiences. The workshops, interviews and memory walks invited the women to consider the broader experience of imprisonment and other women’s experiences and stories were often interwoven with their own in ways that highlighted the various factors and vulnerabilities that contribute to women’s imprisonment. The content and direction of the memory walks and interviews were largely dictated by the women. This meant that they could reflect on how social injustices and inequalities played out in their own lives and the lives of women in prison.
However, time constraints were again felt by some of the women who commented that the workshops sometimes felt rushed or ended too soon when there was more to say. The intensity of the process and the pressure to be a “good advocate” also make it difficult for some of the women to advocate in the ways they had hoped for. One woman reflected: “I feel a heavy weight on my shoulders because I feel we have such a duty to tell the stories of women who have been incarcerated and I'm always frightened that I can never do
that job well enough.” Another commented that, whilst being used to telling her story in a more rehearsed way as part of her work, the emotional intensity of the return meant she was struggling to speak: “I don't understand why my heart is not open to that, because I've told my story before. Now, because I'm feeling the emotion, I'm not on it, I'm shutting down, my heart's closing.” The intense process of personal healing conflicted with her desire to speak on behalf of other women in prison.
The women’s own expertise, experience and professional advocacy work was brought into some conversations, even though this was not the explicit focus of many of the discussions. There were conversations about women and imprisonment, the mental health system and the care system that drew on the women’s personal and professional expertise and experience. This also happened through conversations with the other women, who encouraged each other to talk about their work and share their talents. The women were given opportunities to self-advocate and amplify their work, another of Power Play’s core aims, particularly in the one-to-one interviews where more time and space could be given to this. Power Play have also collaborated with some of the women on related projects and continue to do so.
• Is the film and process able to change public perception and creating systemic change?
The project, from its foundational documents to the interview questions, workshop activities and other processes, move the discussion and understanding of imprisonment beyond the personal to discussion and recognition of wider systemic issues. The women themselves often raised these wider issues during the workshops, in particular the social factors that contribute to women’s imprisonment, even as part of icebreaker activities. Power Play’s approach and attitude made clear links between personal stories and systemic issues and the team demonstrated understanding of these and commitment to making change through their work. They worked with a range of advisors with experience of the prison system and systemic issues to draw on the expertise and experience of a range of voices. Some of the women were motivated to take part in the project after speaking to the Sophie and Polly and feeling that they were committed to social justice and creating social change. One of the project’s core aims was to challenge inequalities in process as well as output and it achieved this through implementing tangible measures such as valuing participants as paid creative collaborators and creating employment opportunities for women and nonbinary crew members.
Whilst it is difficult to fully assess the changes to public perception and systemic change that the project can make at this stage, there are dissemination plans that include collaborating with some of the women on future projects and consulting with them about future dissemination. There is not yet a clear plan for
dissemination to a range of audiences, including reaching policy makers and politicians that would be able to instigate and advocate for social change, but it is under development. Similarly, it is difficult to fully assess the related core aim to create a film of the highest artistic standard, but the levels of professionalism and expertise of all involved in the project, as well as the quality of Power Play’s previous projects, indicate that the final documentary project will meet this aim.
This project provides invaluable learnings and examples for trauma-informed practice when working with criminalised women with histories of trauma, or with other marginalised groups. Here we outline our key recommendations and learnings for future projects
a) Develop trauma-informed and person-centred project documents: policy and practice documents provide the foundations for the project and are the framework to which the team can return to reestablish core principles. Trauma-informed documents are the first step to developing a traumainformed project. These should incorporate and consider: flexibility; issues of pace and timing; care and communication; language; care practices such as hot food, water, breaks and travel arrangements. Training on developing trauma-informed policies would be invaluable starting point for team members developing foundational documents.
b) Develop clear and appropriate communication styles with participants: use considered and appropriate communication strategies such as qualitative questionnaires and careful, responsive and ongoing conversations to gather key information and develop an understanding of participants’ hopes and expectations for the project, their motivations, needs and requirements. Consider using different communication avenues and styles according to what suits the participants and to ensure they are fully aware of what participating will and could involve. Clear and responsive communication fosters trust and understanding, core conditions for a trauma-informed project.
c) Create ample space, time and resources for therapeutic support: ensure that therapeutic support is included and make plenty of space, time and resources available for this. Space should be incorporated into the schedule for both planned and unplanned therapeutic support. Funding should be made available for continuing therapeutic support after the completion of the project where required by participants. All therapists or caseworkers on the project should be provided with supervision. Therapists and supervisors should be recruited with the input of individuals with relevant experience and expertise and consideration should be given to participants’ histories, experiences and intersecting identities when recruiting appropriate therapeutic support.
d) Payment for time: payment at equity rates (or equivalent) for participants is essential for acknowledging the value of individuals’ time, experience and contribution to the project. Any project budget should ensure that payment for participants’ time and related costs is fully covered.
e) Informed consent: Informed consent to participate in the project must not be a one-off conversation and gathering of consent. It should involve: clear and ongoing communication in formats that are accessible to the individual; making project plans, policies and procedures available in an accessible
form; therapeutic support to consider the impact of participation on wellbeing and mental health; and creating space for questions, concerns and uncertainties to be aired. There should be a discussion of the anticipated experience before, during and after the completion of the project and particular consideration should be given to any dissemination plans. This should include clarity on anonymity and confidentiality (if afforded, in what form) and editorial control over the final output(s) (if available and to what extent).
f) Incorporate reflexivity throughout the process: ensure that space is incorporated for reflexive conversations within teams and with steering group/advisors/partners and that planning documents and policies are circulated for critical feedback. This creates a culture of reflexivity, openness to feedback, flexibility and willingness to adapt and change. This should include reflecting on motivations and expectations for the project and considering how and when these might conflict with the needs and wellbeing of the participants. These values are essential for understanding positionality and the ways in which pre-existing ideas, attitude and positions can shape the project. Aim to develop a reflexive practice that ensures defensiveness or lack of awareness do not prevent necessary changes to practice in the light of critique and feedback.
g) Consider participant’s familiarity and comfort with process and techniques: consider what processes and practices are central to the project and how familiar participants are with these. Where necessary and possible, provide time and space for participants to get used to speaking on camera, for example, in the different project settings. This may require: practice runs; allowing time to experience the set up ahead of the process (seeing how close cameras will be, how they move around etc.); and time to ask any questions/make requests. Regular check-ins about understanding and feelings about processes and techniques should be incorporated into the schedule and frequent reminders of the process should be incorporated. These may be over and above what is imagined to be necessary in order to account for the heightened emotions and impact of the process.
h) Create clear and well-planned dissemination plans: A clear plan for dissemination that meets the aims of the project should be developed, acknowledging that this will change and develop across time. This will ensure that a full understanding of potential and anticipated audiences is made available to participants and demonstrate a clear plan for meeting the aims of the project. Eg. if an aim is to impact policy or influence public opinion, consider who the project will be disseminated in order to achieve this.
While doing this evaluation, we thought of the women as “wounded storytellers” - ancient figures in myth whose wounds give them their narrative power, whose wounds are part of the story and the price of the story, whose wounds are evidence of the story’s truth (Frank 1995: xix). This project asked a lot of the women, and this was acknowledged explicitly by the facilitator and Power Play team at various stages. It required a willingness to revisit and publicly share often personal, emotional and painful elements of their lives. It demanded collaboration and sharing with the other women, despite not all having pre-existing relationships. It offered the opportunity to use the platform to advocate for change in the prison and justice system, which also came with a sense of pressure and heavy responsibility for some women. The “woundedness” of these women was also deeply connected to the place in which the filming was taking place, which brought layers of memory, histories, embodied experience, emotional risks and unpredictability into the process. Emotion, place and lived experience are deeply connected and the return to Holloway was always going to be a confronting experience. In order to work from a careful, traumainformed approach, Power Play’s task was to facilitate this storytelling in a way that was safe and felt satisfying to the women. They needed to create a foundation of emotional safety that enabled the story to be told and to sustain it throughout the process - referred to by some of the participating women as emotional containment - by responding to the women’s needs and desires and addressing the challenges that inevitably arose. Although there were challenges and some conflict or tensions in the process, as discussed, the trauma-informed approach from the project’s inception meant that the women were kept at its heart and, as one woman told us, Power Play have created a “beautiful blueprint” for doing traumainformed creative work and devised a project that was “amazing” to be part of.
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