A Bush Theatre production in Association with Live Theatre, Newcastle
Some women long their whole lives to be asked that, to be asked how they are, if just by a complete stranger.
Butlins Skegness, Chalet Number 12, where the Walker women have been holidaying since 1961.
This year it’s Nana Barbara’s seventieth and everyone’s airing their dirty laundry. Loretta’s had too many camp cocktails, Jolene’s fallen tits over teeth for a Redcoat, Abigail’s harbouring more than knickers and hairspray in her suitcase.
A shockingly funny journey through five decades of birthdays, weddings and hen dos, which asks can we ever really cut the apron string that ties us to our parents?
Read what audiences are saying here.
This production is generously sponsored by Gianni and Michael Alen-Buckley
Lee graduated from Manchester University with an MA in Novel Writing. His most recent play Crocodiles won The Hodgkiss Award and will be produced by The Royal Exchange Theatre in Spring 2014.
Theatre credits include: Snap (Young Vic), Gary Lineker is Gay (Paines Plough),Chalet Lines (Bush Theatre/Live Theatre), No Wire Hangers (Soho Theatre),Lashes and Taches (Northern Stage), Donna Disco (Chicken Pox Fox/Live Theatre), Me and Cilla, M&S S&M, Orlando Spoon, Julian Scary, I Heart Morrissey, Liquorice, Funny Valentine, Shitty Shitty Bang Bang, 6C Nativity, Circus Girl (Live Theatre), Jonathan Likes This (National Theatre/Live Theatre), Swan Song (New Writing North/Live Theatre), Chocolate (West Yorkshire Playhouse), LOL (East 15),Rola Cola, Freddy Hearts Freddie, Me Fatty (Ugly Sister Productions), The Window Letters (Theatre in the Mill), The Bang Gang (Bad Fox/NTC), Rabbit Rabbit Rabbit (NTC), Paper Men Hold Hands (Monster Productions), Monster(Bold As Brass)
Radio credits include: Me and Cilla (‘The Wire’ BBC Radio 3), Glow in the Dark(Free Thinking Festival, BBC Radio 3), Magpie (Encounter, GIFT Festival) Prom, Snowglobe (BBC Radio Newcastle)
TV credits include: Coronation Street (Story Associate, ITV), Scallywagga (BBC3)
Film credits include: Harvest (Superkrush Films), Take My Bones (SiZe Records)
Madani took over as Artistic Director of the Bush Theatre in 2012. He directed the critically acclaimed UK premiere of The Royale in 2015 which was revived in 2016. In 2013 he won the Groucho Club Maverick Award for the theatre, following the most successful season in the theatre’s history which played to 99% capacity. Also for the Bush Theatre he has directed The Principles of Cartography as part of Black Lives, Black Words, Zaida and Aadam as part of This Place We Know, Perseverance Drive and Chalet Lines.
Madani is currently working as a member of the Mayor of London’s Cultural Board.
Prior to his appointment at the Bush Theatre, he was Artistic Director of Freedom Studios in Bradford, Yorkshire where his work included the site-specific work, The Mill – City of Dreams. He has also worked nationally and internationally as a theatre director, writer and practitioner. He was previously Director of Red Ladder Theatre Company’s Asian Theatre School where he directed included Silent Cry, Free World and Streets of Rope.
He originally trained in film, and his debut short film Ellabellapumpanella, commissioned by the UK Film Council, was screened at the Cannes Film Festival in May 2007. He was the recipient of the Decibel Award at the South Bank Awards show in 2006.
Omar is an award winning Italian/Palestinian theatre director, deviser and performer, who trained at Jacques Lecoq International Theatre School in Paris. He joined the Bush in 2012 alongside Madani Younis and since then has been the resident Associate Director. He is in charge of the Bush’s talent development, leading on the Associate Artists and Project 2036 schemes. He is also involved in the development and delivery of the Bush’s artistic program and lead the programming of the RADAR festival between 2012 and 2015. His directing credits for the Bush include gig theatre sensation Misty by Arinzé Kene, the Edinburgh Fringe First winning NASSIM by Nassim Soleimanpour, One Cold Dark Night by Nancy Harris and Islands by Caroline Horton. As Associate Director, he has worked alongside Madani Younis on the Bush’s productions of The Royale, Perseverance Drive and Chalet Lines. Other credits include acclaimed site-specific production The Mill – City of Dreams, Olivier Award nominated You’re Not Like The Other Girls Chrissy, Testa di Rame (Italy), Les P’tites Grandes Choses (France) and L’Envers du Décor (France).
Theatre includes: The Importance of Being Earnest (Regent’s Park
Open Air Theatre);Well (Apollo); The Vagina Monologues (Wyndhams);Potted Potter, An Evening of Wonder (Garrick); Ruby Wax: Losing It (Duchess);Why The Whales Came (Comedy); Derren Brown: Enigma (Adelphi); Something Wicked This Way Comes (Old Vic); The Lady Of Burma (Riverside Studios); Professor Bernhardi, Rose Bernd, The Roman Bath, Jenufa (Arcola); How To Disappear Completely and Never Be Found (Southwark Playhouse); Breakfast With Jonny Wilkinson (Menier Chocolate Factory);Marilyn and Ella (Theatre Royal Stratford East); Bloody Poetry (Jermyn Street); Hundreds and Thousands (Soho); Cotton Wool (Theatre503).
Regional UK work includes: designs for Oxford Stage Company,
Mercury Theatre Colchester, Derby Theatre, New Wolsey Ipswich and Sherman Theatre, Cymru. Touring productions include: Bad Jazz and Gizmo Love (ATC); Teenage Kicks, Stones in His Pockets and Trainspotting (MGL); Pete and Dud: Come Again and The Alchemist (Seabright Productions).
Dance includes: Latin Fever (RGL at Peacock Theatre/tour); Into the
Hoods (Peacock); Entangled (The Place).
Opera includes: The Gamblers (Royal Festival Hall); Atalanta (RCM/
Britten Theatre);Mahagonny Songspiel, Das Wunder Teatre (Poliziano
Theatre, Montipulciano).
Musicals include:My Fair Lady (Kuala Lumpur); Bells Are Ringing
(Union); Trevor Nunn’s production of A Little Night Music (Central
Theatre, Budapest).
Tom trained at Central School of Speech and Drama in Theatre Sound and is resident sound designer for international physical theatre company Parrot{in the}Tank.
Designs for the Bush: 50 Ways To Leave Your Lover, 50 Ways to Leave Your Lover at Christmas, The Broken Space Season (as Associate), The Aliens (as Associate), The Schools Season.
Other recent design credits include: Love Love Love (Paines Plough, Tour), The Chairs (Theatre Royal Bath), The Road To Mecca, The Roman Bath, 1936, The Shawl (Arcola),Everything Must Go, Soho Streets (Soho Theatre), Holes (New Wimbledon Studio), Terror Tales (Hampstead Studio), The Hostage, Present Tense (Southwark Playhouse), Faustus (Watford Palace, Tour), Faithless Bitches(Courtyard), FAT (The Oval House), Just Me Bell (Graeae, Tour), Blue Heaven (Finborough), Pitching In (Latitude Festival, Tour), I Can Sing A Rainbow with Nabokov and Sheffield Theatres (Lyceum Sheffield), Pendulum (Jermyn Street), Journalist and Hope (ICA London), Machinal (Central), Bar Of Ideas (Paradise Gardens Festival and Glastonbury/Shangri-La).
Theatre includes: Mongrel Island, Realism (Soho Theatre), The Rivals (Theatre Royal Bath & West End).
Television includes: More Than Words, Survivors, Starlings, Waterloo Road, George Gently and The Street.
Theatre includes: The Baron (Old Vic & Time Warner Ignite), The 24 Hour Plays (Old Vic), The Importance of Being Earnest (Antic Mind Theatre) and Christine (New End Theatre).
Television includes: Scott & Bailey, George Gently, Heartbeat, The Royal and DCI Banks.
Film includes: Tyrannosaur and Donkey Punch.
Theatre includes: Top Girls (Chichester Festival Theatre, Trafalgar Studios), A Month in the Country (Chichester Festival Theatre), Pains of Youth, Women of Troy (National Theatre), Bedroom Farce (West Yorkshire Playhouse), Breathing Corpses and Country Music (Royal Court).
Television includes: My So Called Life Sentence and Tess of the D’Urbervilles.
Film includes: The History Boys.
Theatre includes: Brighton (Garter Lane Theatre), The Beauty Queen of Leenane (Theatre Royal Waterford & tour), Many Roads to Paradise (Finborough), Ivanov (National Theatre), Night Songs, Fire Face (Royal Court) and Medea (Queen’s Theatre).
Television includes: StrikeBack, George Gently, Kindness of Strangers, The Heart Surgeon and Brookside.
Film includes: Oliver Twist, The Heart of Me, All the Queen’s Men and Les Miserables.
