No kids – now what?
How to be Amazingly Happy is a mid-life quest for joy, identity and belonging in this big-hearted show of storytelling and physical comedy.
Fringe debutant Victoria Firth didn’t know if she wanted kids, but didn’t get them anyway. In this live, raw and immediate show she tells us of seeking medical intervention, coming up empty handed and ultimately coming to terms with her position and discovering what to do with the second half of her life as a non-mother.
This funny, physical, playfully entertaining and occasionally provocative show will resonate with the many woman – and their partners – who are unsure if they want a family. Or lack the right partner/circumstances to match their white picket fence dreams. Also the many people who have IVF, those that don’t, won’t or can’t have children and looks at how they build a life outside of the accepted trajectory. Family diversity is greater than ever but there is still very little social validation for childless women.
On the surface the show is about frivolous escapades into finding that elusive joy, fulfilment and life balance that we all desire. Under the surface it’s looking at these things in the context of not having children. Victoria thinks many woman end up in complicated discussions with themselves about whether to have children, how to do it if they’re single, or in a same sex relationship, find out they can’t have kids or missed the window, try IVF and fail and/or are worried what life looks like without taking that step. Then finding the future is bright and happiness really is an option.
Victoria is a performer, theatre-maker and director from Yorkshire who believes theatre should be joyful and full of heart. She has been Director of Yorkshire’s Lawrence Batley Theatre, one of the country’s best-known and respected regional theatre’s, since 2007. After experiments with tap dancing, running, baking, clowning, cabaret and stand-up comedy she felt a call to action, a belief in herself to make HOW TO BE AMAZINGLY HAPPY when attending a Bryony Kimmings’ theatre making workshops. It is her first full length solo show.
