A Super Happy Story (About Feeling Super Sad) the multi award-winning cabaret musical about depression will have an extended London run after a sold-out Edinburgh Festival Fringe run, a successful national tour and a critically acclaimed stint at Vaults Festival.
Written by writer for Netflix’s The Crown and Olivier award winner Jon Brittain (Rotterdam, Margaret Thatcher Queen of Soho) with music by Matthew Floyd Jones (Frisky and Mannish), the show is a joyful, buoyant, gleeful, slightly silly, sugar coated, unrelenting and completely super happy show. Except for all the bits about depression.
Super Happy Story… follows Sally’s struggles with depression, her initial recovery, and the pitfalls of living with a mental illness – all while aiming to dispel the myth that depression means nothing but constant sadness. It was inspired by the company’s personal experiences and informed by people living with mental health problems and medical professionals. The team spent a year researching for the show, interviewing 50 people living with depression, speaking to psychiatrists, the NHS, mental health nurses, representatives from the charity Mind and psychologists.
The show not only won Best Musical Award and the Fringe First Award at Edinburgh Fringe 2017 but was also shortlisted for the Mental Health Foundation’s first ever Mental Health Fringe Award.
In addition to the cast and crew having had mental health awareness training from Mind UK, mental health volunteers, including from Rethink Mental Illness and Lambeth and Southwark Mind, will on hand after as many performances as possible to signpost anybody affected by issues in the show to help available.
Jon said: “I think theatre can be really important in increasing empathy. For people with a history of suffering from the illness, it will hopefully be comforting to see someone else dealing with similar problems. For people who haven’t experienced depression, hopefully it can act as a window and help them be more understanding in the future.”
Alex Mitchell, Artistic Director of Silent Uproar, added: “We wanted to create something that challenged the notion that depression is just being a bit sad. We wanted to create a fun show for people who are living with it, but also for their mate that doesn’t really believe that depression is a thing.”
Co-produced by Hull UK City of Culture 2017, the production has been made possible with the support of Arts Council England, house touring network, Hull City Council, New Diorama Theatre, Hull NHS Clinical Commissioning Group and Hull Truck Theatre.
The first two performances and every Tuesday performance is Pay What You Decide. These tickets can be booked free of charge, however you are asked to make an optional donation at the end of the show.
A Super Happy Story (About Feeling Super Sad) is at The VAULTS 1st April to 3rd May 2019.
