Russell Plays: 1: Breezeblock Park; Our Day Out; Stags and Hens; Educating Rita

Breezeblock Park is set on a northern council estate and takes a look at the suffocating effect of possessions and possessiveness: Trenchantly observed…hilarious, upsetting and somewhat seditious. (Variety); Our Day Out is about a school coach trip, an exuberant celebration of the joys and agonies of growing up - a Dickensian fairytale…I have rarely seen a show that combined such warmth and such bleakness. (The Times); Stags and Hens takes place in the gents and Ladies loos of a tacky Liverpool club, where Dave and Linda have decided, unbeknownst to each other to hold their stag and hen parties…a bleakly funny and perceptive study of working-class misogyny, puritanism and waste (Guardian); Educating Rita: one way of describing Educating Rita would be to say that it was about the meaning of education…another would be to say that it was about the meaning of life. A third, that it is a cross between Pygmalion and Lucky Jim. A fourth, that it is simply a marvellous play, painfully funny and passionately serious: a hilarious social documentary; a fairy-tale with a quizzical, half-happy ending. (Sunday Times)