From Olivier Award-nominated writer Duncan Macmillan (People, Places and Things), Every Brilliant Thing comes to the West End for the very first time with an outstanding cast featuring Lenny Henry, Ambika Mod, Sue Perkins and the show’s original co-creator Jonny Donahoe.
Co-directed by Jeremy Herrin (Best of Enemies, Wolf Hall Trilogy, Ulster American, A Mirror), this unique and critically acclaimed play has become a global stage phenomenon, playing in over 80 countries worldwide.
Borders are shut. The country is underpopulated. Citizens are required to have children.
Nia, a prominent journalist, has always sat on the fence about these regulations despite it impacting her and her husband’s lives. As she seeks to escape from the country and tell the story of what’s happening in a now isolated nation, she is forced to interrogate the cost of what she’s leaving behind.
What does it mean to have a significant part of your life forced upon you?
A dystopian drama that explores love, parenthood, and free will.
Part of the Royal Welsh College of Music & Drama’s annual NEW Festival.
Meet recovering addict Frankie, played by renowned political comedian Mark Thomas.
Frankie’s just been sentenced to three and a half years in jail for dealing drugs.
When he gets there, none of his fellow convicts are what they seem. And with his typewriter, his activist soul, and his sore lack of a right hook, he somehow finds his way into their troubled hearts, and they into his.
In the most unexpected of places, he discovers that the revolution is not dead. It’s just sleeping.
A brand new play from the writer of the Fringe First winning England & Son and A Political History of Smack & Crack, Ed Edwards reunites with Mark Thomas to tell a tale of freedom, revolution and messy love.
A bumper celebration of new writing and writers, to celebrate Paines Plough’s 50th birthday and raise funds to secure our future.
The evening featured an exclusive new piece entitled ‘The Next 50’, written by our patron James Graham and performed by Monica Dolan.
Followed by extracts from some of Paines Plough’s seminal productions, performed by guest stars:
Appearances will also include Indhu Rubasingham (Director Designate of the National Theatre), and playwrights James Graham, Roy Williams, Mark Ravenhill and Ryan Calais Cameron.
This event is part of Paines Plough’s 50 for 50 Campaign which aims to raise £50,000 to support its work at at time when new writing is under threat. There are so many stories in danger of never being heard, and we want to make sure we can spend the next 50 years finding them.
The true story of a cultural martyr and a cultural oppressor.
When two penniless actresses meet in Shanghai at auditions for Ibsen’s A Doll’s House, they quickly become inseparable. But as political upheaval rips through China, their tumultuous friendship will alter not only the course of their lives, but the course of history. One will become China’s first female director. The other, the architect of the Cultural Revolution.
Amy Ng’s newest play looks at the untold story of two of the most influential women in Chinese history – Madame Mao and Sun Weishi – and how the personal truly is political.
This year, Paines Plough celebrates its 50th birthday, and this big joyous yellow dome celebrates its 10th.
So here it is: our celebration.
We have another packed programme showcasing some of the very best new writing that the country has to offer. Just like the plays and the writers we have championed across our 50 years, these are stories that blaze with laughter, hope, love and fury.
They come from voices and perspectives you might never have heard before, speak about the world in new ways, and hold a mirror to our relationships with ourselves and one another.
We hope you love them just as much as we do.
Scroll down to see the full Roundabout at Summerhall programme…
Abigail’s mum is dead. But it turns out she can’t afford her to be.
Did you know how expensive it is to die? It’s £4000 for the funeral. Extra for flowers. And even more if you want sausage rolls. Otherwise, she will get a council funeral and an unmarked grave.
Then, when a theatre suddenly pulls out of Abigail’s new project, she is asked to write about something else. Something more raw, from her ‘unique working class lens.’ Something that will make the audience feel really, really bad about themselves. Audiences like that, apparently.
Yep. To afford the funeral, she has to write about her mum.
Winner of the Scotsman Fringe First at the Edinburgh Festival 2024, with power and playfulness, Kelly Jones’s new play tackles the inequalities around death, and the cost of turning your loved ones into art.
A rave, a protest to ‘kill the criminal justice bill’ and a night that will have consequences for decades to come.
Moving between 1994 and 2023, Dissonance is a play exploring the importance of protest, how each generation gets blamed by the next for not doing enough, and why we need to listen to each other.
An international group of young democrats are working for an NGO called Democracy in Action in Zimbabwe in the run up to the elections.
Their goal, to educate and help register voters, but an increasingly violent run up to elections brings chaos their way testing the very reason for their commitment and presence in the country.
Trim? Fresh.
Skin? Glowing.
Vibes? Immaculate.
Nathaniel is a serious romantic who sees love as a fine art. He’s looking for the Mona Lisa to his da Vinci, and tonight is the night: his date with Destiny…’s Child.
Winner of the Bruntwood Prize for Playwriting 2022, Nathan Queeley-Dennis’ debut play is a love letter to Birmingham, exploring Black masculinity through Beyonce lyrics, techno raves and the deeply intimate relationship between a man and his barber.