Previous Productions
Down T’allotment | 2024
In the heart of Bradford lies an unexpected oasis: an allotment bursting with life and music. Down T’Allotment is a brand-new play by Bloomin Buds Theatre Company that takes audiences on a journey into this vibrant community space where the soil is rich and the bonds are even richer.
As the story unfolds, we meet a diverse cast of characters, each with their own dreams and struggles, united by their love for the land and the joy of growing their own vegetables. Amidst the rows of kale and carrots, friendships blossom, secrets unravel and lives intertwine.
But it’s not just the vegetables that thrive in this urban sanctuary; it’s the music, too. Original live performances punctuate the narrative, adding rhythm and soul to the tale of camaraderie and connection.
Through laughter, tears and the occasional sing-along, Down T’Allotment celebrates the resilience of community, the power of nature and the transformative magic of tending to something greater than oneself. Join us in this enchanting journey where the seeds of friendship are sown and the harvest is shared with love.
Mantality X Bloomin’ Buds
Bloomin’ Buds have been working on an exciting new project exploring male mental health in collaboration with mental health charity Mantality.
We have started the process in working towards creating a play to that highlights all the themes we have been exploring through its progress as well as those that have come up through talking to men.
The project sparked from conversations with the Mum’s in one of our Mum and Baby groups. They shared with us their struggles with their partners mental health problems, trying to know what best to do for them. We wanted to explore this and get people talking about it more.
At the beginning of January we started an ACE-funded two week Research and Development period with an amazing team of creatives. This was extremely successful and produced a 20 minute sharing which we presented to an audience at Kala Sangam arts centre at the end of the two weeks. Watch a recording of the sharing here.
Edinburgh Fringe 2023
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Edinburgh Fringe 2023 |
Where is Love
A proper Bradford lass born 1959, Shelly is a firecracker. A chilling coming of age experience of unyielding adversity. Follow this true account of one woman’s brave fight against the cycles of domestic abuse. A gritty story about sisterhood, family secrets and broken hearts that somehow leaves you laughing.
Continue to follow Where is Love’s progress by following their Facebook page, and Jennifer Johnson’s Instagram and Twitter.
Creative Team
Written by Jennifer Johnson | Directed by Grace Wilkinson | Produced by Katie Mahon | Script Editor – Charlotte Byers | Musical Director – Claire O’Connor | Technical Director – Ellie Cansdale | Performed by Maeve Brannon
Break the Chains
A true story about overcoming some of life’s greatest hurdles. With a history of loss, addiction and heartbreak this Bradford bloke tells us how he turned his life around and became a mental health advocate on the world’s biggest stage, warts and all. An hour of honesty, laughter and inspiration.
Creative Team
Co-Written and Co-Directed by Jennifer Johnson and Leah Hand. | Co-Direction and Sound Design by Morgan Scriven | Producing Support from Katie Mahon | Assistant Direction from Peter Johnson | Lighting Design by Ellie Cansdale | Performed by Robert Blowman
Burned Out
Burned Out follows a nurse who is barely making ends meet. When the foodbank she has been relying on to feed her family loses its main benefactor, Becky makes it her mission to find who is responsible. Selflessness prevails in the end, proving our NHS is more than worth fighting for.
Creative Team
Written and Directed by Jake Thompson | Performed by Mian Rahman as Abraar, Olympia Poşircă as Becky, Jake Thompson as Michael, Rowan Naylor-Mayers as Lee and, Amy Lowes-Smith Multiroling as Kirsten, Liz, and Laura.
Edinburgh Fringe 2022
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Edinburgh Fringe 2022 |
A Young Girl’s Guide to Madness
Have you ever felt so isolated and confused about the world? Surrounded by judgement, pressure and horrifically high beauty standards, Jess confesses her innermost thoughts to you all in order to process the state of ‘madness’ she believes she is in. School, broken friendships and trying not to fear men, it’s clear that to be a teenager in the modern age has new complexities, Jess just wants you all to understand.
Taken from real life experiences and encounters from the writer; A Young Girl’s Guide to Madness truly displays how draining it is to be a teenager in the 21st century, a combination of film, live theatre and spoken word.
After a successful run at the fringe, Charlotte would like to thank everyone for their continued support.
Written and performed by Charlotte Ellis.
Doll
Cassie, a young twenty something from the Northwest of England, has moved to the “arse end of London”, looking for better opportunities and new beginnings. She finds herself however, riding out the hours with her ‘meals on wheels’ eating landlady or avoiding the gaze of the creepy Chris’s at her local green-king. That is until she meets Harley. Handsome, adventurous and a charming seller of…sex dolls. Harley brings the excitement back into Cassie’s dulled evenings…but at what cost?
Doll is a comedy drama inspired by real crime, incorporating themes of manipulation, power dynamics and loneliness. How blind can infatuation make you?
Created by Common People Theatre Company; Morgan Scriven and Leah Hand
A Mighty Fall from Grace
A Mighty Fall From Grace follows the life of a Bradford Bulls fan, whom over several years watches his club deteriorate on and off the field and who’s mental health deteriorates throughout as a result. This hard-hitting piece tackles subjects of depression and schizophrenia in a relatable, working class way, with light-hearted, comedic moments throughout.
The one hander won best play at a showcase event at the Lowry theatre in Salford in 2019, before being performed at the inaugural Bradford Fringe Festival in the same year. It was at BFF where Jake was first introduced to Bloomin’ Buds and the chance of his piece being produced. Since then Jake has been working closely with Bloomin’ Buds as an artist in residence, with the end goal of touring the piece around working class areas of the north and beyond. Jake and Bloomin’ buds were extremely proud to have brought this piece back to the Bradford Fringe festival earlier in 2021. In 2022 A Mighty Fall From Grace, toured around the North East.
Written and performed by Jake Thompson.
Broke Her
Broke Her is a new and original 3 person script created by Steel Harbour Productions that is being Produced by Bloomin’ Buds Theatre Company. We are excited to bring this intense and mysterious thriller to the stage in 2022. The premise of the play is Isobelle wakes up in her own house tied to one of her dining room chairs with a well suited gentleman at her table drinking tea, he seems to know everything about her life and is unsure how or why. The play is set over 40 mins of what is essentially a hostage situation where the kidnapper is playing cat and mouse mind games until the play reaches its climax in the ending as the audience are blindsided with a huge plot twist. Things are never as they seem.
Written & Directed by Luke Mosley.
Performed by Liam Duggan, Emily Lloyd, Jamie Phillips, and Drew Noon.
Assigned
A brand new play which explores concepts such as identity, expectation and self and society’s labels. ‘Our heritage, our culture, our experiences, our likes, our dislikes, our hobbies, our very being. How can you fit everything about a person into one tiny box? There is a whole universe of crazy, complicated and unanswered questions out there, within that void of identity and existence.’ As humans, we constantly try to identify and belong, which means we can be boxed up and defined beyond our true meaning. Compressed, packed, labelled, categorised – what does it all really mean?…And where’s the returns label?
Created by Inner Triangle Productions; Gina Jovanovich, Bradley Pattison and Corin Ward.