Connections 2024: The Sad Club

Performed by Spotlights Community Youth Theatre

This is a musical about depression and anxiety.

It’s a collection of monologues, songs and duologues from all over time and space exploring what about living in this world stops us from being happy and how we might go about tackling those problems.

Luke Barnes is an award-winning writer. Credits include: Freedom Project (Leeds Playhouse); All We Ever Wanted Was Everything (Bush Theatre & Paines Plough with Middle Child); No One Will Tell Me When To Start A Revolution (Hampstead Theatre); Chapel Street (Bush Theatre); Bottleneck (Soho Theatre with HighTide); The Jumper Factory (Young Vic, HOME, and Bristol Old Vic); Lost Boys (Unity with National Youth Theatre); Cinderella – A Wicked Mother F*cker of a Night Out (James Seabright & Not Too Tame); Katie Johnstone (The Orange Tree); The Saints (Nuffield Theatres, Southampton); Eistedfodd (HighTide); There Should Be Unicorns (London International Festival with Middle Child); Ten Storey Love Song (Hull Truck with Middle Child); Weekend Rockstars (Hull Truck with Middle Child); A Wondrous Place (Manchester Royal Exchange/ Northern Stage/Unity/ Crucible, Sheffield); The Class (The Unicorn with NYT); and Loki and Betty (Almeida Theatre). TV: Minted In Manchester (Original Single for Channel 4).

Adam Pleeth is a composer and musician who has worked across plays, musicals and dance. As a composer, his works include: The Elephantom (National Theatre & West End); James and the Giant Peach (West Yorkshire Playhouse); Pitcarn (Shakespeare’s Globe & Chichester Festival Theatre); This May Hurt a Bit (Out of Joint); Wolves in the Walls and Red Riding Hood and the Wolf (Little Angel Theatre); Laika (Unicorn Theatre); The Hartlepool Monkey (Gyre & Gimble, UK tour); Ballad of the Burning Star and Juana in a Million (Theatre Ad Infinitum); Caucasian Chalk Circle (National Youth Theatre of Wales); The adventures of Curious Ganz (Silent Tide/Little Angel Theatre) and Time Stands Still When I Think of You (The Place).