Prime Cut are an independent theatre company and we are based in Belfast.
This is our twenty-fifth year anniversary.
The company specialises in producing international contemporary writing.
I wake up and - boobs, you know, like no one asked me, just pop up overnight
like in Alien, the film with Sigourney Weaver,
only out my chest, twice.
Want to give them back, thank you bye.
I’m a boy, then eleven, then boobs.
‘Scorch’ is a new play written by a Belfast playwright called Stacey Gregg.
We first produced it two years ago and we produced it in a very small way
to kind of feel the temperature of it and it absolutely exploded
and the play is a one person play and it is about the experiences of a gender curious teenager.
The play is based on a lot of court cases that happened in the UK
where young people, specifically three young women, had presented themselves on an online forum as male
and then went on to have relationships, sometimes sexual, and ended up in prosecution.
Bioshock, Minecraft, Black Ops, The Last of Us, Assassin's Creed, Halo, Grand Theft Auto, Watch Dogs,
gaming online, I am twelve, thirteen, fourteen, always choose the coolest avatar.
Always dudes. If not, a Mushroom but usually dudes.
The response to the play has been absolutely extraordinary.
I kind of think what has happened with it is that sometimes plays hit a zeitgeist
where the subject matter becomes really high profile and relevant
in terms of the conversations that society is having all over the world
so somehow it has really touched a nerve.
Wish I could hang out with you
emoticon, emoticon, emoticon -
no exclamation marks - exclamation marks are needy.
Stylistically it’s very interesting as well, the piece is in the round,
there’s aspects of the play where the character of Kez is in group
so the audience really can’t escape the engagement and interaction in the show
because our actor is sitting amongst them, sharing her story with them.
Cute boys who are girls photo stream, like, like, like, search, like, like, like, bookmark, like, like.
People like me. There are people like me on there, tonnes.
I think what it does do is it that it gives an insight into the media’s perception
and how the media have interpreted these quite high profile court cases
and vilified young people in a way.
That’s not to undermine the very, very complicated moral questions that it raises
but I think what it does do is that it gives us an in of understanding how difficult it is
for any young person or older person to grapple with these very, very seismic essential questions
about who and what they are.
Theatre has such a vital role to play in people’s understanding of who and what the process of living is
and it seems to me that it’s more important now than ever in the world that we inhabit.
I’ve written apologies to Jules, to her mum, dad.
Sorry...I, sorry I..., I don’t know why I.., I don’t know but I’m so sorry and I’m guilty.
Solicitor blinks,
dad nods.
Guilty.