“All children whose parents have been busted up by war – never are the same. We’re a special breed.”
August 1956. It’s a day of excitement. Young Sammy comes to live with his father and stepmother, 15 years after they escaped as refugees from Nazi Europe. Raised from infancy by an aunt in Croydon, he now comes to London to work as an apprentice. But the young man’s arrival – eagerly and nervously anticipated – disrupts the secrets and settled ways of this rackety Jewish household and their neighbours, in ways nobody could have foreseen.
Michael Hastings “writes with an intimate knowledge of Jewish working-class life” (Jewish Chronicle, August 1956)
Tricia Thorns’ Two’s Company is acclaimed for bringing a series of forgotten masterpieces to London theatres, in sparkling new productions. Their world premiere production of Michael Hastings’s only unperformed play, The Cutting of the Cloth, was described as “A production so exact you can smell it. The thrill is in the documentary detail, marvellously realised in Tricia Thorns’ terrific production” – The Observer.
Other productions include London Wall (“rivetingly entertaining” -The Guardian), A Day By The Sea (“A joy” – Daily Express) and What The Women Did (“a complex and funny evening” – Time Out)
Praise for Don't Destroy Me:
★★★★ “Tricia Thorns’ punchily atmospheric revival ….is a poignant, beautifully acted revival. A resonant piece of theatrical history that still ignites today.” – The Times
“Timely revival of Michael Hastings’ unsettling 1956 play that examines the legacy of war on immigrants in postwar London” – The Guardian
“ Post-war life is beautifully captured in this revival of a forgotten curio” – The Telegraph
