Baby

Description

By Gurpreet Kaur Bhatti

★★★★ ‘Baby is beautiful and brilliant’ All That Dazzles

They name me Baby. Means you’ll never seem old, even when you are. You’ll always bring hope, even when there is none. And you can always pretend you’re wanted, even when you’re not…

Baby’s bright and beautiful. Baby’s trouble. Baby can do things nobody else can and why not? Britain’s got talent, hasn’t it?

Baby’s had it tough and she wants to keep Bliss. That’s all she wants. But something terrible stands in her way.

Now Baby has to solve a problem….and you’re part of her solution. Because you’re proper people. You must be, to be reading this. Plus, there’s nobody else she can ask…

Baby is coming…

★★★★ ‘A thought-provoking powerhouse of a production.’
Theatre And Tonic

★★★★ ‘A sobering piece of theatre.’
Liam O’Dell

Content Warnings

Criminalisation, imprisonment and probation
Adverse childhood experiences (including neglect and sexual abuse)
Separation of mother and child through imprisonment
Foster care
Sex work
Abusive relationships
Drug and alcohol use
Self-harm
Arson and physical injury

If you are affected by themes in the show or would like more information, please see the self-care guide here, which includes a detailed content notice list, resources for reflection, grounding and signposting to relevant support services.

Production Warnings

Flashing lights
Loud noises

Pearl Mackie is best known for her ground-breaking role as Bill Potts, the Doctor’s companion in Doctor Who (BBC) opposite Peter Capaldi, with television credits also including The Diplomat (Netflix), The Long Call (ITV), and Tom Jones (ITV). Her recent work includes Sylvia Samuels in Lucy Kirkwood’s The Human Body (Donmar Warehouse), Natasha Elcock in the acclaimed Grenfell: In the Words of Survivors (National Theatre) and Ballet Shoes (National Theatre).

Writer Gurpreet Kaur Bhatti
Director Milli Bhatia
Set & Costume Designer Khadija Raza
Lighting Designer Bethany Gupwell
Sound Designer Elena Peña
Casting Director Nadine Rennie CDG
Movement Director Gabriella Schmidt
Assistant Director River
Design Associate and Costume Supervisor Maariyah Sharjil
Company Stage Manager Catherine Mizrahi
Artist Wellbeing Practitioner Eshmit Kaur
Assistant Stage Manager Anya Williams
Production Manager Sy Supersad

Gurpreet Kaur Bhatti writes for stage, screen and radio. Her first play Behsharam broke box office records at Soho/Birmingham Rep. Her second play Behzti was sensationally closed after protests at the Rep. It won the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize. For Clean Break, she has written Scenes from Lost Mothers, a touring production on the experiences of women who have experienced maternal seperation in prison.

Other credits include A Kind of People, Royal Court Downstairs; Choir, Chichester Festival Theatre; Marriage Material, Lyric Hammersmith/Birmingham Rep; Khandan, Royal Court/Birmingham Rep; Behud, Soho/Belgrade; Silence, Donmar Warehouse; 846, Stratford East; Elephant, Birmingham Rep; Dishoom, Rifco/Watford Palace Theatre, Fourteen, Watford Palace; the feature film Everywhere And Nowhere; DCI Stone, Radio 4; Londonee, Rich Mix; Dead Meat, Channel 4 and An Enemy Of The People, BBC.

She is developing original series Masala for Hometeam/Universal, adapting Black & Blue by Parm Sandhu for Cuba Pictures as well as Brando’s Bride by Sarah Broughton as a feature for Ffilm Cymru Wales.

She is also developing plays for NT Connections and the Royal Court. She is a voting member of BAFTA, a trustee of the Peggy Ramsay Foundation and an ambassador for Birth Companions, a charity that works to improve the lives of women and babies who experience inequality and disadvantage. Her plays are published by Methuen.

Clean Break changes lives and changes minds through theatre – on stage, in prisons and in the community. It produces ground-breaking plays with women’s voices at the heart of its work.

Founded in 1979 by two women in prison who believed that theatre could bring the hidden stories of women who are criminalised to a wider audience, Clean Break remains true to these roots. The company has been inspiring playwrights and captivating audiences with award-winning plays on the complex theme of women and criminalisation for over four decades.

Clean Break’s commissioned playwrights have included Alice Birch, Deborah Bruce, Lin Coghlan, E V Crowe, Vivienne Franzmann, Tanika Gupta, Katie Hims, Sam Holcroft, Theresa Ikoko, Lucy Kirkwood, Chloë Moss, Rebecca Lenkiewicz, Winsome Pinnock and Rebecca Prichard.

Current productions include Blis-ta (an audio drama by the late Sonya Hale, BBC Audio Drama Award winner), Sweatbox (a film of Chloë Moss’s acclaimed play set in a prison van) and Hope (a film by Nicole Hall, Michelle Hamilton, Kirsty Housley, Carina Murray, Natasha Jean Sparkes, and River, available on Clean Break’s Knowledge Hub).

Recent productions include Scenes from Lost Mothers by Gurpreet Kaur Bhatti (national tour), The Trials and Passions of Unfamous Women (co-created by Janaina Leite, Lara Duarte & Athena Maria, Yvonne Wickham, Sarah-Jane Dent, Dominique Lavine Wood-Whyte, Kim Teresa (KT) Marsh and Rachel Valentine Smith, LIFT Festival 2024), Dixon and Daughters (by Deborah Bruce at National Theatre, now available on NT at Home), Catch (a small-scale touring play by Sonia Jalaly), Favour (by Ambreen Razia, Bush Theatre) and Typical Girls (by Morgan Lloyd Malcolm, Sheffield Crucible).