The Acts (2026)

The Acts (Jan 2026)

Friday 23 – Saturday 24 January 2026, 8pm

The Weston Studio, Bristol Old Vic

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The Acts is a gathering of four daring new works from some of the UK’s most exciting disabled theatre makers.

Caitlin Magnall Kearns weaves a love story of desire, guilt, and aging with tender humour in The Ache of It; Kathrine Payne’s dark comedy body job follows two lovers as they collide and unravel, exploring the growing phenomenon of lonely deaths in the UK and the tangled realities of shame, labour, and love; Tatum Swithenbank conjures REALMS, a spell-like journey through folklore, disability, and magick; and SO SHA invites us into Pruu the Pidj, a music-led ritual about survival, softness, and finding home in unlikely places.

In a cultural moment that asks disabled artists to fit into neat boxes, The Acts asks what happens when we refuse. When we choose mess, ritual, pleasure, grief, humour, and grit. When we make art on our own terms.

The Acts comes to the Bristol Old Vic for two nights on Friday 23 and Saturday 24 January 2026.

Act 1

Tatum Swithenbank brings REALMS, a genre-bending journey through ritual, disability, folklore, and magick. Guided by mythic creatures and grounded in pagan sabbats, the show casts a spell on life, death, belonging, and the portals between body and spirit, memory and myth.

Act 2

Caitlin Magnall Kearns presents The Ache of It, set in a seaside B&B in Northern Ireland. Simon, a married cab driver with osteoarthritis, and Fiona, a fat, bisexual widow, navigate a decade-long affair. The piece centres disabled, fat bodies in a tender, funny, and honest exploration of desire, guilt, aging, and care.

Act 3

Kathrine Payne’s body job follows two cleaners at a death site alongside two lovers who collide and unravel in a cramped flat. As “lonely deaths” rise in the UK, this visceral work probes disconnection, shame, labour, and the messy realities of bodies and love.

Act 4

SO SHA shares Pruu the Pidj, a music-led ritual inspired by a pigeon building a nest on anti-pigeon spikes. Blending story, rhythm, and raw tenderness, it charts survival, sobriety, and being unhoused, creating a gentle, alive space for grief, humour, breath, and becoming at home in oneself.

Caitlin Magnall Kearns

Writer: The Ache of It

Tatum Swithenbank

Writer & Performer: REALMS

SO SHA

Writer & Performer: Pruu the Pidj

Kathrine Payne

Writer: body job

Georgi Arthur

Performer: The Ache of It & body job

Nathan Patterson

Performer: The Ache of It & body job

Natasha Trantom

BSL Performance Interpreter

EM Williams

Performer: body job

Peyvand Sadeghian

Performer: body job

Pruu the Pidj

SO SHA

REALMS

Tatum Swithenbank

The Ache of It

Caitlin Magnall-Kearns

body job

Kathrine Payne

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