365

August - September 2008

Overview

J is 16. She has so much to hope for. Tonight is the first night of the rest of her life – her first night in her own place. She is finally free of the faceless and noisy world of corporate parenting that has made up her short life. And here, in this flat, she can learn the skills needed to become an adult – budgeting, shopping, cooking, cleaning…

But J won’t use her full name. She won’t look at a clock or wear a watch and has no understanding of time. She has no idea what her story is, what her truth is. She is a jumbled mixture of melted memories and until she can make some sense of it, J hasn’t really got a chance. Tonight, in the silence, she must begin to learn a lifetime.

J is one of fourteen young people we meet, who every day and night of every year, piece together fragments of their past to create a future. 365 is the story of trying to understand your own story. Of trying to become an adult.

There are currently over 70,000 children in care in the UK and, on average, they pass through eleven stages of being “looked after” by the state.

365 is a crucial new piece of work from the National Theatre of Scotland that lays bare the ordeals of just some of these young people, who with their humour, imagination and raw courage take their first faltering steps towards adulthood.

Set in the transitory and surreal world of a practice flat – one of society’s mechanisms to gently introduce young people in care to the outside world – 365 is a powerfully visual piece of theatre created by the National Theatre of Scotland’s Artistic Director Vicky Featherstone with text by David Harrower.

Also featuring a specially composed song by Paul Buchanan of the Blue Nile and choreography by Frantic Assembly’s Steven Hoggett (Black Watch).

A co-production with the Edinburgh International Festival.

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