Back from a mini tour of Yorkshire and Stockport and cheering for supporting act Indignation Meeting
Shook, Southwark Playhouse London
Timely indictment of how young offenders are failed by prison system
PIC CAP 'Shit parenting': Andrea Hall (Grace) with Ivan Oyik (Riyad) Pic: The Other Richard
ALISTAR FINDLAY is mesmerised by this multiple ‘Visions of Scotland’ assault on the audience’s eyes and senses
The Star's critics ANGUS REID, ANDY HEDGECOCK and MICHAL BONCZA reviews I Am Love, The Penguin Lessons, Freaky Tales, The Thicket
MAYER WAKEFIELD has reservations about the direction of a play centered on a DVLA re-training session for three British-Pakistani motorists
New releases from Steve Knightley, Jupiter & Okwess, Jason Palmer, Lisa Knapp and Gerry Driver, Kin'Gongolo Kiniata, Ingrid Laubrock/Tom Rainey, Dan Sealey, Simin Tande, PAZ
JOHN GREEN relishes photography that unfolds a longstanding and poetic relationship with Leeds
A uncomfortably misogynistic authorial voice that sometimes seems to lack insight troubles FIONA O’CONNOR
THE PAPATANGO New Writing Prize never fails to deliver a stimulating work and this year’s winner is no exception.
Samuel Bailey’s timely debut play takes us behind the peeling walls of a young offender institute where three 16 to 17-year-olds — Cain (Josh Finan), Riyad (Ivan Oyik) and Jonjo (Josef Davies) — are taking “shit parenting classes” to escape the menacing monotony of prison life.
New prison instructor Grace (Andrea Hall) is tasked with trying to teach nappy changing and CPR, but keeping the boys’ focus proves to be her greatest challenge. All three are facing long sentences and although they have dreams of making lives for themselves outside, their hope is being drained by a system only concerned with short-term discipline rather than lasting reform.
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