Created by performer, Clementine Bogg-Hargroves with Zoey Barnes (who also directs) the long-term collaborators last saw fringe success with stark, funny and sometimes shocking onewoman show Skank which, also produced by Mark Ashmore, received numerous five star reviews, sold out its run in 2021 and was nominated for the Offies 2021 OffFest award.
Please Love Me is the second full length play from Clementine Bogg-Hargroves and Zoey Barnes. And whilst Skank was certainly semi-autobiographical, this work is all the more personal and all the more autobiographical. The whirlwind show sweeps the audience into the mind of a teenager and explores the flux and change experienced in the life shaping time after childhood, finding your feet in adulthood. Feeling all powerful and entirely powerless, full of hope and full of despair, having fierce ambition yet being totally directionless. Skank was dark, Please Love Me is darker, a work that deliberately messes with form, style and tone. But it’s a comedy, we promise.
Please Love Me is a one-woman tragi-comic spectacle about a teenage girl making all her first mistakes and what’s happening in her head as these experiences shape her. Our protagonist cheats on her boyfriend (a lot), gets pregnant with her first love who seems to despise her, works as a stripper, loses her best mate and goes on what turns out to be a bit of a traumatising trip to the Middle East. In this highly personal show, Clementine Bogg-Hargroves draws heavily on her own experiences of growing up to explore themes of morality, strength and the difference between love and validation (can we ever really be sure we’ve learned how to tell the difference?)
“Good thing I was such a nightmare back then, otherwise this show would be really boring.”
Clementine Bogg-Hargroves reflects on her past experiences through movement, pole dancing, 2000s clubland style original songs and storytelling, with music by George Roberts and director Zoey Barnes also co-devising lyrics from Clem’s perspective. All this combines with fiercely personal storytelling to create a blissful, challenging mix that spans from silly comedy to provocative art.
