Following a sold-out run at last year's Manchester International Festival, a film of Maxine Peake’s solo performance of Kay Dick's dystopian They will play (one show only) on International Women’s Day (March 8) at the city's Aviva Studios.
Last year's MIF world premiere of the rediscovered work, in the city centre's John Rylands Library, was adapted by Peake, director Sarah Frankcom and Imogen Knight. The film of the event will be followed by a question and answer session with Maxine Peak and, from March 9, the performance will be available on demand from Factory International's online platform, Factory+.
First published in 1977, Kay Dick’s novel They: A Sequence of Unease, went out of print for years but was recently rediscovered. It imagines a near-future in which creative expression is outlawed, all art eradicated and resistance takes courage. It asks the viewer if it would be enough to go on, quietly creating work for only yourself to enjoy; to memorise favourite passages before all books disappear? What is art without an audience or a debate?
The adaptation is the latest festival collaboration from Maxine Peake, Sarah Frankcom and Imogen Knight, following The Masque of Anarchy (2013), The Skriker (2015) and The Nico Project (2019).
The trio – as newly-formed company MAAT, a collective to make about music, art, activism and theatre - will next present a new adaptation of John Bowen’s cult-classic Robin Redbreast at Aviva Studios from May 17-26.
More info and tickets here