Tackling ageing without children in 'Otherhood' - a new play part of Bradford 2025 led awards programme

Otherhood by Bradford-based Old Bird theatre company follows a grieving widow and a queer millennial who discover the power of finding family in unexpected places. The show will visit The Beacon at Lister Park, Thornton Community Centre, Caroline Street Social Club, Keighley Creative, Mind the Gap and Bradford Arts Centre (formerly Kala Sangam).

The inspiration for the show came from Director Deborah Pakkar-Hull’s own experience of being childless, which included going through several rounds of IVF. “I was in the lucky position of having many friends who also did not have children (both by choice and circumstance),” Deborah explains. “I had had many conversations with them about the assumptions made by others; the subtle and not so subtle exclusions; the invisibility; and our concerns for growing older without the support of children. Also talking to friends who were parents, there was a lot that they too related to, and so I thought that perhaps here were the seeds of a resonant story worth telling.”

When Deborah teamed up with Writer Emma Adams, they both spoke about the communities they had created for themselves. Deborah continues: “Communities made up of friends, siblings, and their children allowed us to still feel connected to family, and to take on nurturing/parenting roles, and that this was something we both really valued; this idea of found family is something that the queer community have been leading the way with for years.”

Emma adds, “There's a lot of joy in the show. It’s moving but also entertaining, funny and surprising with original surround sound music and a choir of Bradford voices bringing hope to a story that will touch on all the emotions. You may shed a tear, but you'll also laugh and be taken on a journey that defies all the stereotypes we have about what it means to be childless.”

All these elements make for an immersive theatre experience that includes real life stories of being childless from individuals living in Bradford. Collected during creative writing activities and facilitated conversations in the research and development period of the show, Deborah and Emma spent several months sifting through the material to determine the story they were going to tell. “This was incredibly difficult,” Emma says. “All the stories people had told were worthy of sharing, reflecting the many joys and struggles of being childless or child-free. They intimately connected with the listener by being voiced by the very people who had lived through them. Including them in the play is a way to share stories that are often kept in the shadows, to acknowledge the diversity of experiences around being childless and child-free, and to honour the generosity and openness of those who shared their stories with us.”

Their voices will be heard over nine speakers surrounding the audience, Emma explains: “Both Deborah and I had worked on writing and directing projects involving audio that had had a significant impact on us in revealing the rich potential of sound as a storytelling medium. This sparked an interest in integrating sound into this show. In carrying out the research for the project, we recorded the sessions with different communities of childless people across Bradford and the testimony that emerged from these sessions was moving, compelling, and beautifully captured the diversity of childless perspectives. We knew then that we had to find a way to feature these voices in the show.”

The cast includes Lisa Howard as Peg, Beth Organ as Teagan and Emmerdale’s Flo Wilson as Peg’s wife Ola. Otherhood will tour across Bradford District from September 23 to October 16.

To book tickets head to: https://bradford2025.co.uk/event/otherhood/