Abstract/Summary

Representation becomes imperative in times of crisis; concurrently, such periods can be marked by a threat to the functions of democratic, cultural, and political representation. In this chapter, I explore the distinctive practices of Camden People’s Theatre (established 1994) and Brighton People’s Theatre (founded in 2015) to reflect on the utility of people’s theatres in discrete moments of social, political and artistic crisis in the UK. The economic crises of 1990 and 2008 have shaped life in the UK over the past 30 years and it is these two moments of acute crisis act as buoys marking the terrain of my analysis. Through an examination of the creative practices of these two companies and the contexts in which they emerged, I establish the distinctive practices of people’s theatres as a mode of making that responds to conditions of crisis