Selene
Alexander Wright & Phil Clive Grainger, with Megan Drury
Wright&Grainger and Theatre@41 co-production
Lowry, Salford
September 25-26, 2026; 80 mins, no interval
(also at Theatr Clwyd, Mold, October 8-10)
From rural Yorkshire to festival stages across Australia and New Zealand, theatre-makers Alexander Wright and Phil Grainger, working as Wright&Grainger, have turned Greek mythology into immediate stories.
Orpheus (2019), The Gods. The Gods, The Gods (2023), Helios (2024) and now its sister piece, Selene, shifting the gaze from sun to moon and to the Moon Goddess Selene’s daughter, Panda.
Panda is a moon-obsessed Yorkshire girl negotiating adolescence and early adulthood, armed with a list of “all the things I am not” - her insecurities and perceived inadequacies.
She is fascinated by the Apollo moon landing. Aldrin and Armstrong’s footprints intrigue her, but so does Michael Collins, alone in lunar orbit for 22 hours, experiencing the dark side and later describing the experience with the words, “I am it”.
As Panda matures, she discovers the light and darkness within her own orbit. There are sensual visits to the Dark Side nightclub, where she dances freely, and a naked plunge into the moon's reflection in a cold lake with her friend Bonzo. Her journey brought to mind author Marianne Williamson’s words from A Return to Love: “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us".
At 24, the same age her beloved father died, Panda finally conquers fear and finds her own light. Standing naked before a mirror illuminated by the moon’s reflection, she declares: “All the things I am.”
Informally welcomed into the Lowry studio by collaborator and performer Megan Drury, we sit around a horseshoe-shaped performance space. This 80-minute, one-woman show combines poetry, audience participation and direct storytelling, and Drury is vivacious, committed and engaging.
Yet I never quite found the emotional connection I wanted. Wright’s narrative is imaginative and intelligent, but dense, demanding concentration; I occasionally lost the thread as Phil Grainger’s soundtrack, a spa-like tranquillity wash with a persistent bass pulse, competed with Drury’s poetic delivery. Simple lighting leaves the audience in near-full light as we become protagonists, reading character parts or howling like werewolves.
The Dark Side nightclub is the exception. Suddenly, dark, multi-coloured theatrical lighting transforms the space, and we stop nervously looking at one another. With no set beyond three moon-like orbs, a microphone and taped-down cable, a head mic might have helped balance music and voice better.
Drury is a superb performer, and I wanted to be drawn deeper into Panda’s world, instead of watching her break character to change tracks on her iPad, adjust lighting, consult cue-cards arranged like a clock face or drink from her water bottle. The show can feel closer to a festival workshop than a fully realised theatrical world.
Selene (the Moon Goddess) character is true grit. Read by a man in the audience, she didn't draw the moon across the sky in her silver chariot, but drove a white HGV truck. Panda’s dead father - Endymion in the original myth - becomes an unnamed presence, immortalised in family photographs. Bonzo is played by an audience volunteer - a bold but risky device for an important role. I thought the man might be a planted actor at first, and I longed to hear Drury embody Panda’s Yorkshire accent.
Finally, the ending deserves space to breathe, instead of Drury immediately moving into company information and tour details.
Selene explores identity and self-acceptance: the courage to step into our own light at any age. I simply wanted its theatrical moonlight to shine more brightly. The show currently feels designed for the intimacy and informality of a festival tent, cushions on the floor, its audience fully part of the experience.
More info and tickets here
