Idea Submission

Archived: Crying In The Chapel

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Crying in the chapel by finkon

Fink On Theatre would like to produce an original piece of theatre that tells the inside account of the Strangeways prison riots of 1990 and encourages young and repeat offenders to engage with the arts, with the hope of helping them discover new possibilities for their future.

Strangeways prison was built in 1868 to house and rehabilitate a maximum of 970 prisoners. In 1988 Strangeways Prison held around 1660 men in appalling conditions. For some years prior to 1990, the policy of the prison was not to house and rehabilitate, but to control and contain. These conditions in which prisoners had to endure were said to have come “no longer tolerable.”

These conditions and the prisoner’s frustration of not being able to voice these social injustices caused the “powder keg” prison to explode. During the 25 day prison rooftop protest, police and prison officials drowned prisoners out with sirens to stop their pleas and demands from being heard. Newspaper reports of kangaroo courts and castrations were wide of the mark later being described as "Unethical for presenting speculation and unconfirmed reports as fact".

These social injustices are still very much at the heart of our prison system today

Crying in the Chapel is a dramatic piece of factual theatre that gives a voice to those prisoners who played an active part in the prison uprising and that we hope will give a voice to the underprivileged that are entangled in the failing system.

We have been extremely thorough with our research and feel privileged to have had the accesses to the source material that has enabled us to write this piece, putting us in a unique position in regards to tackling this issue.

This production will mark the 20 year anniversary of the riots and will pull no punches in highlighting the conditions and the treatment of the inmates before, during and after the riots. It will tell of how the prisoners gained complete control of inside the gaol and why it wasn’t contained within the chapel.

We will contact young and repeat offenders through crime prevention charities, halfway houses, parole offices, prison support groups and organisations who are already working in this sector.

We will offer these young people a chance to take part in a free workshop lead by professional actors offering free theatre tickets to see the production itself as an incentive to take part.

This will take place at Contact Theatre, Manchester 26th April until 8th May 2010.

Contact Theatre is an ideal place for the young and disadvantaged to get involved in the arts and we believe this exciting peice of Manchester's socail history will be extreamly excessable to them.

Amount applied for: £3500