YOUNG Carers from Salford embarked on a 27-venue, five-week national tour to showcase their lives in a theatre production.
The play began in Salford in October touring the UK and concluding at the House of Lords on the 5th of December.
Who Cares? Is a play that highlighted the realities that four young carers from Salford endure, which are under the radar of social services and schools.
The play was well received, as within a couple of weeks more than 20 schools and organisations encouraging the show to tour the UK.
Ultimately the play has helped the four carers put their issues on the table and to help them influence politicians both locally and nationally.
5 weeks, 27 venues, 4000 young people & today we end #WhoCaresTour at @UKHouseofLords to raise awareness of young cares. What a journey @The_Lowry @YACSalfordCarer pic.twitter.com/aiaHdH13nA
— LUNG (@LungTheatre) December 5, 2017
The theatre production, written by Matt Woodhead and co-produced by The Lowry and LUNG Theatre, was based on a year of interviews that offered a rare insight into the lives of three young carers from Salford.
The play made a partnership with The Gaddum Centre’s Salford Carers Service, to support the available and local young carer’s services.
Touring across the country the play visited youth settings, non-traditional theatre spaces, were chosen in partnership with Onside Youth Zones – a national youth centre charity.
Who Cares? Began production in 2016 when The Lowry and Salford Young Carers Service within the LUNG Theatre that would shine a light on the uncountable stories of young carers in Salford.
Paul Moran, from YAC Salford Carers project, who works with young carers specifically, said: “We’ve worked in conjunction with The Lowry and produced three films, toolkit for schools, creative writing written by young carers and two years ago we decided that the project for 2016 would be a play.
“The Who Cares? Play was about four young carers, who were interviewed on a monthly basis. Matt Woodhead, created the script from ‘verbatim’, which was about the words of young people and his aim was to produce a performance about these young people
“The production started in November 2016 and it was that well received and stunning that people wanted it to go further, into the wider community rather than just Salford.
“The Lowry then worked incredibly hard and got funding from various sources who then made it possible to produce a 27-day tour around the UK. It started at the Lowry in October and finished in the House of Lords yesterday (5th of December).
“We had talks between myself and various people from the theatres was that the concept of the play was to use theatre and drama to bring about social change.”
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