Co-commissioned by West Yorkshire Playhouse and Greenwich Theatre

BROKE

Displaced families, gambling addictions and beans on toast. Real life stories from the front line of poverty and debt in the UK.

Question: Sally is British and broke. If Britain owes over £900 billion in National debt and Sally has been on minimum wage for most of her working life with the interest on her debt being equal to her monthly outgoings, then who is more broke, Britain or Sally? Based on interviews taken across the UK in 2014, multi award winners The Paper Birds explore, with real life stories from the front line of poverty and debt, what it means to be broke in this visually stunning new production. A heartfelt and urgent look at the debt of a Nation from displaced families and gambling addictions to beans on toast. Premiered at Edinburgh Fringe Festival, Pleasance Dome, 2014.

Written and devised by: Jemma McDonnell & Kylie Walsh

Director: Jemma McDonnell

Cast: Shane Durrant, Jemma McDonnell, Kylie Walsh

Music and Sound Design: Shane Durrant

Producer: Bonnie Mitchell

Set Design: Fiammetta Horvat

Lighting Deisgn : Kylie Walsh & Darren Perry

AV Design: The Media Workshop

‘Using their trademarks of physical and verbatim theatre, the Paper Birds have created a piece of work about debt that is honest and searingly painful. By concentrating on intensely personal stories – including their own – they have found the universal.’

Yorkshire Post

[vimeo https://vimeo.com/183481392]