Photos: In Rehearsal for SUMMER CAMP FOR BROKEN PEOPLE At Pleasance London

The REcreate Agency and Grace Dickson Productions presents Summer Camp for Broken People written by Emily Beecher at Pleasance London, 9 - 20 May.

"I think I've been lucky. Well as lucky as you can get when you're at a summer camp for broken people."

Summer Camp for Broken People is a deeply personal show about sexual violence, motherhood, mental health and, ultimately, love. A one person show - written and performed by award-winning creator of the Good Enough Mums Club musical, Emily Beecher - in a role share with performer Charlie Coletta - this autobiographical story takes audiences through Emily's time at The Priory, after being raped at a work event.

Based on writings Emily first made as she was undergoing treatment for a breakdown, Summer Camp For Broken People doesn't hold back - touching on the darkest moments alongside the levity, from the right outfit for your first day as a psychiatric outpatient, to the friends made in group therapy, to panic attacks and flashbacks, and - most of all - to the power of love and motherhood to keep you going until everything doesn't feel so bleak.

The show was made in consultation with other survivors, and prioritises care at its forefront - neither sanitising the experience, or re-traumatising its audience. Exposing the bureaucracy and fear that survivors undergo when reporting their attack, and reminding us of our generational responsibility to call out predatory behaviour when we see it and empower and believe young women. It asks the audience uncomfortable questions, but leaves space for thought.

Directed by Christa Harris - Associate Director of Olivier-nominated theatre company Les Enfants Terribles - Summer Camp for Broken People shines a light into the darkest of places. Sometimes, we need to sit in a room and pay witness to enable us all to survive and thrive. The show reveals the ways mental illness infects our lives, how fully and physically we hold trauma and what it takes to put a shattered spirit back together.

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