St Joan of the Stockyards

by Bertolt Brecht

Bristol Old Vic Young Company, Jan 2016

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1920's Chicago. An economic disaster looms. 

 

Manipulation of the stockyards by greedy profiteers and an over-production crisis have caused the meat-packing factories to close. 

 

Outside the factory gates the poor and unemployed wait, willing them to re-open in the hope of escaping the bitter grip of winter and poverty that looms. Revolution is in the air. 

 

Into this steps Joan Dark - a fearless fighter and religious advocate, on a spiritual journey to convert the masses and challenge oppression and injustice wherever she finds it. 

 

Written by one the 20th century's most influential playwrights, Bertolt Brecht, St Joan of the Stockyards is a darkly comic, cautionary tale of romance between a meat-packing tycoon and a Christian missionary. More socially and politically relevant now than ever before it invites us to consider the lines of corporate manipulation through which people are controlled, the power institutional religion has to combat economic and social injustice and the resultant effects of all of this on the poorest in society.  

 

Directed by Nik Partridge

Designed by Rosanna Vize

Sound and composition by Ben Osborn

Lighting by James Harrison

Movement by Maisie Newman

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