Papatango today announces the full cast for the world première of Samuel Bailey’s Shook – this year’s winner of the annual Papatango New Writing Prize. The company’s Artistic Director George Turvey directs Josef Davies (Jonjo), Josh Finan (Cain), Andrea Hall (Grace), and Ivan Oyik (Riyad).
The production opens on 1 November at Southwark Playhouse, with previews from 30 October, and runs until 23 November 2019. Following the run at Southwark Playhouse, the production tours to Hope Street Theatre, Liverpool (26 November), Theatr Clwyd (27 – 28 November), Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough (30 November) and Marlowe Theatre, Canterbury (4 – 7 December).
“He’ll look different. My little boy. When I get out. Like… to the picture I’ve got in my head. Be like meeting him all over again. Be a whole new start.”
Instead of GCSEs, Cain, Riyad and Jonjo got sentences. Locked up in a young offenders’ institution, they trade sweets, chat shit, kill time – and await fatherhood.
Grace’s job is to turn these teenagers into parents, ready to take charge of their futures. But can they grow up quickly enough to escape the system?
Winner of the 2019 Papatango New Writing Prize from a record 1,406 entries, Samuel Bailey’s debut full production tenderly and honestly examines the young men society shuts away.