Pornography – 53two
Simon Stephens’ Pornography is a dark, gritty play, spotlighting the lives of 8 people in London at a time of momentous excitement – and horror. It focuses on individuals living through the awarding of the 2012 Olympics, swiftly followed by the 7/7 bombings in the capital, showcasing the crash from euphoria to chaos.
Red Brick Theatre, the collaborative, Manchester-based theatre company, took on the task of performing the first professional production of Stephens’ play since 2009, a year after it was published. The piece is written as a collection of seven scenes, published in numerical order to serve as a countdown to the bombings, but Red Brick opted to separate and intertwine these scenes instead – meaning that the performance had a highly fluid nature to it.
Upon entering 53two’s...