Performing Crisis

Clare Wallace's study examines how British theatre of the twenty-first century has taken up crisis, both as subject matter and as a way of working. Rather than treating crisis as background, the chapters ask what ethical and social responsibilities arise when writers and performance makers stage it.

The book draws on sociology, cultural theory, feminist thought, performance studies and philosophy, and places these fields in conversation with a varied body of productions staged in Britain since 2005. Its lines of inquiry include ageing, austerity, gender, migration, multiculturalism and questions of aesthetic form.

The companies and artists it considers include Theatre Uncut, Lost Dog, Camden People's Theatre, People's Lung, Brighton People's Theatre and Phosphoros Theatre. The playwrights discussed are Jez Butterworth, Caryl Churchill, Tim Crouch, Vivienne Franzmann, James Graham, debbie tucker green, Ella Hickson, Charlene James, Lucy Kirkwood, Simon Longman, Cordelia Lynn, Simon Stephens, Jack Thorne, Chris Thorpe and Gloria Williams.

The study takes up and responds to recent writing in this area, asking how performance reconsiders and reorients the idea of crisis, and how theatre invites audiences to respond to the pressures of contemporary life.