Three Mothers by Matilda Velevitch is an award-winning show about three female characters moving forward and rebuilding lives despite enforced migration, and embarks on a UK tour this summer to coincide with Refugee Week 2019. It starts with a three-date engagement at the Museum of Migration, London from 4-6 June before visiting venues in towns including Manchester, Sheffield, Bradford and Wakefield.
The production is an amalgamation of verbatim research, original text and physical theatre, written, directed, designed and performed by an all-female team.
Full tour details can be found here.
Three Mothers is on UK tour, with a stop at London’s Migration Museum, what can you tell us about it?
The Migration Museum in London is the perfect place to host Three Mothers. Their “Room To Breathe” Exhibition is essentially an immersive invitation into people’s lives, their kitchen, living room, bedroom (complete with dressing table and cupboard of clothing) and places where they meet up and connect. Come and make yourself at home and connect with the stories of people who migrated to the UK. What better place to host a play about three different people coming together, despite adversity.
What inspired you to write Three Mothers?
I began my research into Three Mothers as a direct response to media coverage of the Migrant Crisis in 2015. I was watching it, reading about it – the access to information is endless – but I could not humanly connect with one single person involved.
In the summer of 2015 thousands upon thousands of people arrived at Munich Station each day, seeking refuge. I was there helping out. On one of those days, in a small Bavarian village, whilst lugging boxes of donations in the heat, a German friend of mine turned and said “It was the women who reconstructed Germany after the War. The World had turned its back on us. The country was on its knees and the men were gone. It was the women who kept moving forward and rebuilt our lives.”
I realised that in my own life, in fact in the lives of many people I know, it IS the women who rebuild lives and keep moving forward. I wanted to write THEIR stories.
Why do you think it’s so important this subject is addressed on stage?
Three Mothers isn’t about just watching a show through a screen. It’s about connecting with people. Not just the three women on stage, but with our own lives and the people in them. After our 2017 run people spoke to us and wrote to us about how they felt personally involved in the play and had often looked at their own past or present lives differently as a result.
The most valuable members of Three Mothers are the audience.
The tour coincides with Refugee Week 2019, how will Three Mothers be participating?
We are currently running workshops called Fabric of Our Lives around the UK to bring people together in the run up to the tour.. During Refugee Week we will be performing at the Migration Matters Festival in Sheffield on June 18th, joining Journeys Festival in Manchester at the 3MT Theatre on June 19th and hosting events at the Whitworth Gallery, Manchester June 20th and the JW3 Centre in London on June 24th.
How has the play evolved since it’s last London run?
We were amazed at the emotional and uplifting response from our audience during the performances in 2017 and wanted to concentrate on the themes that struck people the most. By bringing the play to the warm and welcoming Migration Museum and joining Refugee Week Festivals I think we will reach a lot further to connect with non-traditional theatre audiences and into the heart of our communities. This is really important for me.
What would you say to anyone thinking of coming to see Three Mothers?
I’d say “join us”. This isn’t just a theatre show, it’s an invitation into people’s lives and your attendance adds to that. There’s sadness, pathos, nostalgia and a bit of fun. You will leave feeling uplifted, I promise you.
