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The Green, Green Grass of Home: Mr Jones An Aberfan Story - Finborough Theatre

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A life of hope and promise, interrupted, lies at the heart of Mr Jones: an Aberfan Story. The play follows two young people in Aberfan before and after the disaster that killed 144 people, including 116 children. It’s an emotional coming-of-age tale of intersecting lives, family, love, and the shock of tragedy. With two vivid performances and strong characterisations, you feel immersed in 1960s Welsh small-town life. It’s now running at the Finborough Theatre , after performances at the Edinburgh Festival and across Wales.  The Aberfan disaster is well known in the UK but perhaps less so elsewhere. The facts of the tragedy are confined to the programme notes rather than in the piece. On 21 October 1966, the catastrophic collapse of a colliery spoil tip on a mountain above Aberfan engulfed a local school, killing many. The play avoids the causes and negligence, instead focusing on those working and building lives in the town.  Writer-performer Liam Holmes plays Stephen Jones, a...

Life among the poppies: Shoot I Didn't Mean That / The Last Days of Mankind @Tristanbates

Is it okay to smile and take a selfie when you visit a memorial or make a nazi salute gesture in Austria? Maybe even write something glib in the visitors book at the Anne Frank museum? If you did not know the answer to these questions, Shoot I Didn't Mean That starts to explores the implications of doing things like this.

Catriona Kerridge's dark comedy looks in to the strange and surreal downfall of four women as they become fascinated and then obsessed by the politics of The Great War.


In an era of conflict tourism and ongoing global crises, Juliet finds herself making an obscene gesture in a Viennese flea market and finds herself in jail. Two schoolgirls get carried away at a Remembrance Day service and an interpreter loses her voice and her mind listening the antiseptic responses from present day politicians. It's funny but thought provoking as well.

Running along side this new work is the harrowing epilogue to The Last Days of Mankind by Karl Kraus. This part of this epic work is an expressionistic and apocalyptic vision of a world. While Kerridge's work is a response to this piece, played together it becomes apparent how distant modern life is from real horrors.

In a year when light shows and ceramic flowers are stylistically commemorating the outbreak of WW1, this serves as a stark reminder that war is always hell.

It runs at the Tristan Bates Theatre until 18 October and contains replica weapons, haze and some frightening looking gas masks.

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