This summer, Hull headed back to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival as Absolutely Cultured’s Hull Independent Producer Initiative, in partnership with Middle Child, supported by Hull Truck Theatre and Back to Ours, supported shows by five, highly acclaimed and exciting theatre companies from Hull.

The festival once again saw a “Hull Takeover”, as Hull-based theatre companies The Herd, Middle Child, Roaring Girls, Just Club and Back To Ours commission, Casus Circus – a troupe of international acrobats – took to the stage to show the world what Hull is made of.

Ahead of the festival (2-26 August 2019), three of these companies performed previews at Hull Truck Theatre on 13 July.

The Herd – Slime
12:45

Perfectly pitched to engage the youngest of audiences, The Herd performed Slime, the story of a slug, a caterpillar and the quest for a leaf. This squishy, squelchy, hilarious play for two to five-year-olds is a unique, accessible theatrical experience with immersive and colourful play for the very young.

The Roaring Girls – Beach Body Ready
19:00

The Roaring Girls create work that is fierce, feminist and fun. The company was founded in 2014, when Rachael Abbey and Lizi Perry created Skirts, Shirts, and Vintage Dresses for Assemble Fest. Since then, they have been a New Diorama Graduate Emerging Company, performed at BeSTival in Switzerland, collaborated with the University of Hull and grown the company to a core team of five. They took their radically and riotously joyful new show Beach Body Ready, to this year’s Fringe, defiantly championing body positivity and sticking two fingers up at how the media says you should look.

The Herd and The Roaring Girls were Supported Companies at Hull Truck Theatre and The Herd was a Hull Libraries’ Associate Theatre Company.

Just Club – Standing Too Close on Our Own in the Dark
20:30

Formed by University of Hull graduates, founding members and best mates, Jamie Nowell, Matthew Collins and Jake Marsden, Just Club is a new theatre company established in Hull in 2018.  Standing Too Close on Our Own in the Dark is the company’s first ever show.

A gig-theatre event as vibrant and hopeful as it is melancholic, is part stand-up, part gig and part spoken word ramble, which sees its performer pour over a journal of original poetry and comedic monologue, with encouragement from a live band.

Standing Too Close on Our Own in the Dark was supported by Middle Child’s First Show Fund.