Inspired by a cancelled show that caused a social media firestorm, Josie Dale-Jones’ one-woman play, A Little Inquest Into What We’re All Doing Here, opened yesterday at Shoreditch Town Hall.
A Little Inquest premiered last year at the Edinburgh Fringe, and won a Scotsman Fringe First award for its abstract exploration of art, censorship and freedom of expression.
Questioning social norms and the role of the artist, the production examines the fragile balance between artistic license and societal restriction – a dynamic rooted in Dale-Jones’ experience with her previous play The Family Sex Show, whose free-thinking approach to sex education attracted the attention of far-right activists.
After a petition to stop The Family Sex Show from going ahead attracted over 40,000 signatures – many of which were linked to extreme right-wing groups in the US – the play was cancelled while still in rehearsal, which production company ThisEgg attributed to “violent and illegal threats” from a “small group of people with extremist views”.
tHE SHOW QUESTIONS SOCIAL NORMS AND THE ROLE OF THE ARTIST IN A WORLD OF INCREASING RESTRICTION
Speaking to the Hackney Post about the experience, Dale-Jones said: “What we talk about within A Little Inquest is this feeling of feeling protective of the people that I was working with, while being disappointed and having a really intense want to be able to make something happen and being unable to do that – and feeling very small within a much bigger system.”
For Dale-Jones, winning the Scotsman Fringe First award was reassuring: “It felt like a really big gesture of support: an institution putting their name behind the show and what we were trying to talk about, and because of the themes of the show and what it talks about, that felt really important.”
The play is showing until Saturday 15 March at Shoreditch Town Hall, a building that has played an important civic role throughout Hackney’s history and now operates as a performance venue.
“It really excites me that there is a building that throughout history has stood there for open debate and discussion and that it’s still doing that, even if in a slightly different form,” Dale-Jones said.
Ellie Browning, Head of the Cultural Programme at Shoreditch Town Hall, said: “We’re proud to be presenting A Little Inquest Into What We Are All Doing Here in our Assembly Hall this Spring.
“We have admired ThisEgg’s work for a number of years, supporting them via our artist development offer and presenting their work. We are pleased to offer London audiences the chance to see this impeccably crafted show.”
Elise Barry is a beat reporter for Hoxton East and Shoreditch and a student Journalist at City University.