Originally performed on Tuesday 26th & Thursday 28th July 2022 at The Met, Bury
Oluwalonimi Owoyemi
Noah Ros
Ché Tilgui
Oliver Baines
WonderIfTheatre premieres ‘SoftLad/’ A beautifully haunting new piece of writing, exploring the rite of passage of four young men in 2022. Set in a working-class Mancunian town, the teenagers attempt to fathom the kind of men they want to be and more importantly, are expected to be as they battle to find the courage to make their own decisions when faced with the weight of expectation placed on them.
Brother deals with the torment of a family tragedy. Egg faces the decision to come out to his friends. Fish doesn’t know what it is to be a man, scared of bringing shame to his family. And Incel? Well, Incel is determined to protect men from the threat of an empowered women’s movement.
SoftLad/ is a cautionary tale of the pressures we place on young men in modern society and the friction they feel; caught between traditional expectations and an ever fluid narrative of manhood.
“Come back to us when you’ve pruned yourself into that finger-food quiche that we can pop into our mouths and chew, over champagne flutes at white weddings. Or spit at, with mouths full of pork scratchings and Carling. No, I’m madrí, I’m aperol spritz on a winter’s morn at the offy. I’m completely out of place.”
Production Credits
Director.....................................................Jennie Fairclough
Movement Director..................................Leigh Manning
Choreography Support............................Charlotte North
Sound Design...........................................Damir Bojanić
Lighting Design........................................Chris McClung
Production Photography.........................BethanKimages
