SLAVE is one of the most inspirational plays of the decade and it’s back and even more powerful than ever.
Winner of the Best New Play Award (Manchester Evening News); the first Anti-Slavery Human Trafficking Award (presented at 10 Downing Street), and North West Review Best Director, Best Production and Best Actor Award (for a young Lashana Lynch playing Mende), there has never been a more prescient time to revive this award winning show. With civil war and famine raging in Sudan, history is repeating itself. Women and girls are disappearing again and the media is almost silent on Sudan. This show shines a light on the inhumanity of modern slavery and trafficking which is going on right under our noses in our towns and cities around the world today. This play is an emotional roller coaster, not for the faint hearted but a must see for those who want to know the truth. It is told in the unique and indomitable voice of one little girl, Mende Nazer who grows up to be a most remarkable young woman, who eventually gained her freedom and is now a nurse.
Opens at the Lowry on 9th – 12th October then onto Bristol Tobacco Factory, 16th – 19th October, then Shakespeare North Playhouse 22nd – 24th and then Riverside Studios London 30th October – 9th November.
Set in the beautiful Nuba Mountains of Sudan, Mende age 12 is ripped from her family by raiders who burn the village, abduct and sell the women and children. Enslaved for seven years in Khartoum, she is trafficked to London in 2000 by a diplomat, where she manages to finally escape. Mende’s joyful childhood and enslavement is told by an outstanding cast of eight actor-musicians through a glorious feast of storytelling, music and dance and every part of it is approved by Mende and the Nuba community in the UK.
The play celebrates Mende’s unconquerable spirit, the stunning Nuba culture, and is a stark testament to the inhumanity of trafficking and modern slavery. Mende’s voice has a deep global resonance for us in the 21st century, she speaks for the voiceless when she says “no one should be bought and sold.” She asks us all to consider what it is to be free and why fifty million people around the world are enslaved today.
The founder of the Human Trafficking Foundation Anthony Steen said:
“At a time when myths and misconceptions about human trafficking and modern slavery persist, it is vital to raise awareness of the realities of these dreadful crimes. Theatre productions are able to do just that by engaging an audience, many of whom would not have otherwise been aware of the extent of this issue in Britain and encouraging them to take action. We would like to congratulate Caroline Clegg and Feelgood Theatre in continuing their invaluable production, especially considering how greatly awareness of modern slavery still is 12 years after this play received its initial award.”April 2024
At the Manchester Evening News theatre awards in 2011 they judges said
“The play’s integrity and timeliness staged by Feelgood had the audience at The Lowry rapt. Like Mende, we can and should make a difference by standing up and being counted.”
In 2011 the play was performed in the House of Lords in the campaign to establish the Modern Slavery Bill (now enshrined in law). The play is an adaptation of Mende’s book Slave (Virago, written with Damien Lewis).
In parallel to the production Feelgood are working with the Nuba community, the Humanitarian and Conflict Response Unit at the University of Manchester, the Human Trafficking Foundation and the Bakhita Centre at St Mary’s University London. Led by Dr Rubina Jasani and Women Asylum Seekers Together (WAST) there will be a round table symposium ‘EXPERTS BY EXPERIENCE’ at each venue where they will share their own experiences and people will be able to ask questions before and after seeing the play.
Since 2010, Caroline has continued to raise awareness of modern slavery through other projects and also the situation in Sudan with the Mende Nazer Foundation (MNF). In 2016 Mende and Caroline, travelled together undercover to the Nuba Mountains to take medical aid and hear testimony from escaped slaves to report back to the UK government. Subsequent work has seen the building of a clinic and installation of water pumps.
You can now book tickets for Slave: A Question of Freedom at the Lowry Salford Quays with an exclusive two for one offer for Lowry Theatre Club members and tickets start from £19.50. Suitable for age 10 upwards. Link to book is https://thelowry.com/whats-on/slave-a-question-of-freedom/#book
Caroline Clegg and key cast members are available for interviews after 10 August please contact [email protected] or 07919 886488 to arrange.
About Feelgood Theatre
Feelgood celebrate its 30th anniversary this year. Caroline Clegg founded Feelgood in 1994 to create theatre with a definite sense of risk and adventure to delight audiences of all ages with the sheer joy and surprise of live theatre and music. 42 bold productions at traditional and site-specific venues world-wide have enthralled 350,000 audience members and 14,500 workshop participants. In 1994 they flew a WWII American bomber in to Barton Aerodrome for the start of a show, followed by 3 decades of spectacular shows in Heaton Park, and national tours, to Africa, Europe and the West End.
Feelgood has outstanding production values and its roots are firmly embedded in telling stories that challenge us and make a difference.
https://www.feelgoodtheatre.co.uk/
https://www.instagram.com/feelgoodtheatreproductions
https://www.facebook.com/feelgoodtheatreproductions
Caroline Clegg
Caroline Clegg is a theatre and opera director. Most recently she directed the first ever fully staged production of Sir Paul McCartney’s Liverpool Oratorio for Cincinnati Opera, USA and will take it to Seattle Opera in 2025.
She was awarded the Horniman Award for ‘lifetime achievement’ and ‘outstanding services to live theatre’; and holds 4 Manchester Evening News Awards for Best Opera, Best Director, Best New Play and Best Production. She holds the Angel Award for Artistic Excellence, a Queens High Sheriff Award for ‘outstanding service to the community’. In 2023 her world premiere production of the opera Blaze of Glory (Welsh National Opera) was nominated for an international Opera Award and a UK Theatre Award. In 2018 her world premiere production of Rhondda Rips it Up (Welsh National Opera) was also nominated for an International Opera Award and a South Bank Sky Arts Award.
She was awarded a prestigious AHRC Northwest Consortium Doctoral Training Partnership for her PhD research in site-specific music and theatre at the Royal Northern College of Music. She was the John Thaw Fellow at the University of Manchester and holds a Post Graduate Certificate in Education. Caroline is a member of Equity and her early career was as an actor and dancer. She is a proud Lancashire lass born on a farm in Bury. She left school at 15 and believes in the maxim ‘if you can dream it, you can do it!’ She lives in Manchester and rides a Triumph Bonneville.
www.instagram.com/carolinecleggdirects
