Details

Eight years in the making - the four linked plays of Steve Hennessy s Lullabies of Broadmoor - A Broadmoor Quartet weave together the closely linked stories of five of Broadmoor s most notorious inmates of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century with the stories of those they murdered. The sequence of plays form a rich, dark, Gothic tragicomedy about murder, love, madness, personal responsibility and redemption. The doublebills can be seen separately and in either order, but Venus at Broadmoor and The Demon Box are better seen first. Venus at Broadmoor. 1870. The madness of love. A string of random poisonings around Brighton result in the admission of Christiana Edmunds to Broadmoor Criminal Lunatic Asylum. The penny dreadfuls call her the Chocolate Cream Poisoner, but she prefers to be called Venus. Dr. Orange is struggling to understand why. Principal Attendant Coleman is struggling to stay off the drink. The Broadmoor Annual Ball is approaching. Christiana just wants to dance. Based on the true story of Broadmoor s most notorious female patient. The Demon Box. 1872. Inside Broadmoor. Inside the black box of the theatre. Inside the head of Richard Dadd. On a trip to Egypt, the great Victorian artist Richard Dadd believed that he had been contacted by the god Osiris. Upon his return, at the god s bidding, he murdered his father. He spent the rest of his life in Bethlem and Broadmoor. While there he spent nine years working on his eerie masterpiece ?The Fairy Feller s Master Stroke . In 1872 he was given the job of renovating the theatre at Broadmoor ... The Murder Club 1922. Murder is in the air. The British Government is engaged in a genocidal war in Iraq using poison gas and other weapons of mass destruction and two notorious murderers are meeting in Broadmoor for the first time. Small time conman Ronald True murdered the prostitute Olive Young. Embittered out of work actor Richard Prince murdered matinee idol William Terriss at the stage door of the Adelphi Theatre. Now the two men have been put in charge of an evening of entertainment at Broadmoor. The Murder Club was commissioned by the Finborough Theatre to tell the infamous history of a murder committed on the Finborough Road itself, just down the road from the theatre. Wilderness. A journey from the battlefields of the American Civil War to the cells of nineteenth century Broadmoor by way of one of the most famous murders in Victorian Lambeth. This is the story of William Chester Minor, one time surgeon in the American Union Army and a major contributor to the Oxford English Dictionary.

Cast/Performers

Chris Bianchi, Chris Courtenay, Chris Donnelly, Violet Ryder

Creatives/Company

Author: Steve Hennessy
Director: Chris Loveless
Design: Ann Stiddard
Lighting: Tim Bartlett
Sound: Hoxa Sound
Costume: Rebecca Sellors