The Bench Comes Home

Highly acclaimed play The Bench which has had successful runs at many theatres in Manchester including The Library Theatre and Salford Studio is back in the North West – this time in Bolton.

The plot spans a period of 12 months, the lives of an eclectic group of Paradise Heights residents intersect around a bench in the local park. Many of the characters find themselves at transitional points in their lives, and whilst some are desperately holding on to the past, others are even more desperate to escape it and the unbearable pain that has made them who they are. It’s just a bench in the park, the one by the war memorial…A boxer, his trainer, a thief, a fake medium, a homeless man, an artist, a widow, a dealer, a loan shark, an angel and a ghost.  They’ve all sat on this bench at least once this year.

Before the end of the year, someone will die on it…

Joe O’Byrne’s The Bench is being staged at the Octagon next week from 29 – 30 September.