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29th January 2026
2023 MA Drama Writing alum Eva Hudson’s critically acclaimed play Life Before You is touring this spring. The play has been made possible by Arts Council England and Shakespeare at Tobacco Factory Fund. This production is proud to be supporting The Menopause Charity.
The play is directed by 2023 MA Drama Directing alum Roisin McCay Hines. We’re so proud of Eva and Roisin and wish them success with the tour.
About the play
Gráinne leaves Ardoyne, Belfast, for England, chasing the promise of a better life for her daughter. She scrubs, she bleaches, she sacrifices— and piece by piece, she begins to disappear.
Eimear grows up surrounded by privilege, stepping through doors her mother could never open. But with every step forward, she drifts further away — into another class, another name, another life.
As they clash over diverging ideas of womanhood, what surfaces is complex and turbulent, straining their relationships — with themselves and with each other — to breaking point.
Life Before You, a fierce and unflinching new play by Eva Hudson, directed by Roisin McCay-Hines, starring Hayley-Marie Axe (Mudtown, The Devil’s Hour, Red Dwarf) and Georgia Alexandra (Call the Midwife), lays bare the fault lines between mothers and daughters. Addressing women’s healthcare, class, survival, and the erasure of aging women, it asks: what do we pass on, and how do we escape the lives written for us?
Book your tickets for Bath and Bristol:
Theatre Royal Bath – 12, 13 & 14 Feb
https://www.theatreroyal.org.uk/events/life-before-you/
Tobacco Factory Theatres 7 March
https://tobaccofactorytheatres.com/shows/life-before-you/
Further afield? See the full tour dates here: