Lifers E-Book

Evan Placey

• Herausgeber: Nick Hern Books
• Kategorie: Poesie und Drama
• Serie: NHB Modern Plays
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 86

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2025

Beschreibung

'A system is people. These walls and bars didn't build themselves.' Inside the walls of HMP Drummond, long-term prisoners Baxter, Norton and Lenny pass the time with poker, banter and the kind of gallows humour only lifers can muster. When Lenny's body starts to give out, young prison officer Mark keeps an eye on him. What begins as a duty of care becomes an unexpected friendship, exposing the cracks in a system built to punish, not to support. Darkly funny and unflinchingly honest, Evan Placey's play Lifers challenges what we think we know about crime, punishment and redemption. Do some crimes make a second chance impossible? And when the world moves on without you, what does justice really mean? Produced by Synergy Theatre Project, it premiered at Southwark Playhouse, London, in 2025, directed by Synergy's Artistic Director Esther Baker.

Leseprobe

Evan Placey

LIFERS

NICK HERN BOOKS

London

www.nickhernbooks.co.uk

Contents

Original Production Details

Dedication

Acknowledgements

Foreword

Characters

A Note on Punctuation

Lifers

About the Author

Copyright and Performing Rights Information

Lifers was first performed at Southwark Playhouse, London, on 1 October 2025, produced by Synergy Theatre Project. The following cast:

MARK / SIMIAN

James Backway

NORTON

Sam Cox

BAXTER

Ricky Fearon

SONYA / WELLS

Mona Goodwin

LENNY

Peter Wight

Director

Esther Baker

Designer

Katy McPhee

Lighting Designer

Tony Simpson

Associate Lighting Designer

Adam King

Programmer

Jack Goodwin

Sound Designer

Sarah Weltman

Costume Designer

Stella Cecil

Assistant Directors

Jim Mcauley and Frank Skully

Casting Director

Nadine Rennie cdg

Dramaturg

Neil Grutchfield

Production Manager

Jonathan Simpson

Rigging Team

Tom Barton and Joe Howard

Stage Manager

Rhian Kennedy

Assistant Stage Managers

Ronnie Actil and Ronel Thomas

Fight Director

Cristian Cardenas

For Dad. I miss you.

Acknowledgements

Synergy Theatre Project, which I have been fortunate enough to be involved with for fifteen years, is what allowed me to write this play; the company’s support, knowledge of the criminal justice system and prisons, and engagement with a community of ex-prisoners is second to none. Thank you for your expertise and guidance.

The many prisoners and ex-prisoners, prison officers, and medical professionals, who shared with me your experiences – I hope I captured some of it, any mistakes or inaccuracies are entirely my own.

As ever, Neil Grutchfield for helping me build the ship, Jennie McClure for navigating, and Esther Baker for steering it. And though you think the play was my idea, Esther, and I think it was yours, let’s at least agree that you made it finally happen.

For the many insights in rehearsals that helped finetune the play: Ronel Thomas, Ronnie Actil, Jim Mcauley, Frank Skully; James Backway; Peter Wight; Sam Cox; Ricky Fearon; Mona Goodwin.

The initial development of the play was made possible by a Literature Matters Award from The Royal Society of Literature: thank you for your belief in the project.

Thank you also to:

All the staff at Southwark Playhouse and Synergy Theatre Project.

Tanya Tillett and everyone at Casarotto and at The Agency.

Daniel and Kaydon.

Evan Placey.

Foreword

Synergy commissions new plays to provide fresh insights on criminal justice, challenge the public perception of prisoners and further the public debate on issues beyond the headlines.

The care and treatment of older prisoners offers a mirror to our ageing population – both are growing and come with significant challenges around who is responsible for care up to the end of life. We hope that Lifers provides a window into the experiences of people who will age like us and our parents but find themselves within a system that was designed to punish and contain rather than care.

Esther Baker Artistic Director, Synergy Theatre Project

Characters

LENNY, seventies

NORTON, seventies

BAXTER, seventies

MARK, thirties

SONYA, forties

WELLS, played by the same actor as Sonya

SIMIAN, played by the same actor as Mark

A Note on Punctuation

A dash ( – ) is a cut-off, sometimes of one’s own thought with a different thought (not a pause or beat).

An ellipsis ( … ) is a loss or search for words.

A lack of punctuation at the end of a line means the next line comes right in.

/ marks the point in a line where the following line interrupts or overlaps.

[ ] indicates words that are not spoken, but there to clarify a line’s meaning.

Lifers was developed with the support of the Royal Society of Literature’s Literature Matters Award.

his ebook was created before the end of rehearsals and so may differ slightly from the play as performed.

Scene One

BAXTER, NORTON and LENNY are in the midst of a game of Texas Hold’Em Poker. All three men are in their seventies. NORTON smokes roll-ups.

BAXTER. All in.

NORTON. No, don’t be doing that shit.

BAXTER. When you got the cards, you got the cards.

NORTON. You don’t have shit.

LENNY. I’m out.

NORTON. He’s bluffing.

BAXTER. No bluff.

NORTON. Wot you got, old-timer?

BAXTER. You gonna have to pay to find out.

NORTON. What you think, Lenny, Baxter here got pocket jakes?

LENNY. Not getting involved.

NORTON throws his cards in.

NORTON. Hope you’re happy.

BAXTER. I am.

LENNY. Can you blow that somewhere else

Stuff’s painting my lungs

BAXTER. Norton was born with lungs painted black.

NORTON. Dad smoked a pipe every day and he lived til he was ninety.

LENNY. Why don’t you vape?

NORTON. I dunno what’s in that crap.

They done any tests?

BAXTER. Here we go.

NORTON. No not joking around

People sticking all kinds of shit into their bodies

BAXTER. Seriously, Norton

NORTON. I’m not talking about COVID, okay, not talking about vaccines

I’m talking basic stuff

BAXTER. You’re big blind.

NORTON. Baby formula, make-up, food, factory-generated fruit.

BAXTER. You in?

NORTON puts in chips. (Or whatever they’re using in place of chips.)

LENNY. What the hell’s factory-generated fruit?

NORTON. Avocados

BAXTER deals the flop.

LENNY. The hell you talking about avocados?

BAXTER. The flop be hopping today.

LENNY. I’m out.

BAXTER. What you mean you’re out? Might get a free pass, don’t need to put nothing in.

LENNY. Yeah but you’re gonna raise it, so I’m out.

BAXTER. You don’t know what I’m doing, Lenny.

LENNY. You’re an open book, Bax.

Fine.

He knocks/checks.

NORTON. You ever had avocado as a kid?

LENNY. Didn’t know what one was.

NORTON. Exactly. Exactly.

BAXTER. What you doing here, Norton?

NORTON knocks.

NORTON. But suddenly can’t move for the places serving avocado on toast. That not suspicious to you?

BAXTER. I raise you five.

LENNY. I’m out.

NORTON. Wasn’t such a thing as avocado and suddenly

Anybody know what that shit’s doing to their body?

BAXTER. What you doing, Norton?

NORTON puts five in.

NORTON. You notice how the only places who seem to have them is all the places with young people, mums with pushchairs, y’know?

LENNY. I don’t know what you’re talking about.

BAXTER deals the turn.

BAXTER. The turn.

NORTON. What I’m talking about is population control. The planet, the country has too many people on it, right? And now you got all these young people feeding on avocado toast.

LENNY. You think avocado is the government’s way of population control?

NORTON. I’m saying we don’t know, we don’t know, do we? And all these young people just scooping that green shit up and don’t have a clue its long-term effects.

LENNY. And all this is your ad for smoking, yeah?

NORTON. Because who knows what that vape shit is doing – again, young people, see the pattern – but this I know what it’s doing. You see what I’m saying?

LENNY. You’re saying your hearing aids are tuned in to Batshit Crazy.

I gotta piss.

NORTON. No, no breaks.

LENNY. I gotta piss.

NORTON. We said no breaks till the blinds go up.

BAXTER. What you doing Norton?

NORTON knocks.

Raise you two.

NORTON pays it. BAXTER deals the river.

Ooh the river she’s flowing tonight.

NORTON knocks.

Another two.

NORTON. You’re a terrible liar, Baxter.

Go on, let’s see them titties.

BAXTER shows his cards.

Deuce?

BAXTER. Pair of deuces.

NORTON. You did all that for deuces?

BAXTER. Since you only got a high card, yeah.

NORTON. How you know that?

BAXTER. Cos you, my friend, are the terrible liar.

NORTON tosses his cards in.

Lenny?

LENNY. Yeah.

BAXTER. Your deal.

NORTON. What you keep looking at that for?

BAXTER. Crib sheet.

NORTON. You counting cards.

BAXTER. No. Just tips. My daughter brought them. She’s been playing on the internet, you know. Watches these videos.

NORTON. I thought your daughter was having a baby.

LENNY deals them each three cards.

BAXTER. She did. Picked up internet poker while breastfeeding.

Hey, what you doin, Lenny? Only two cards.

LENNY. Shit, sorry.

LENNY collects to re-deal.

NORTON. What’s the kid’s name?

BAXTER. Beatrice.

NORTON. Beatrice? Beatrice?

BAXTER. Don’t be laughing at my granddaughter.

NORTON. Your son-in-law, he white?

BAXTER. Wot?

NORTON. No way some Black man let his daughter be called Beatrice?

BAXTER. The hell you know

NORTON. I don’t know any Black people called Beatrice.

BAXTER. When I came on the Windrush –

LENNY. You got him started now.

NORTON. Alright I’m sorry, don’t wanna hear it.

BAXTER. My parents came here, courtesy of Her Majesty’s Government, so that their kids –

NORTON. You weren’t on the Windrush, Baxter.

BAXTER. The hell you know where I was.

NORTON. Cos I ate some of that rank birthday cake for your seventieth last month and the Windrush were in 1948. Was pretty shit at maths but…

BAXTER. Maybe the lie is how old I am, ever think about that.

LENNY. Blinds.

They all put their two chips in.

BAXTER. Point is my parents worked hard so their kids could have the best opportunities –

NORTON. – Like breaking and entering?

LENNY deals the flop.

BAXTER. And so if they wanted to give their child the name of a princess they damn well could and they damn well deserved it.

NORTON. Flop. Never understood how can you be such a royalist after –

BAXTER. Don’t say after what they did to my people. Wanna know what they did to my people – shook their hands.

When my brother, god rest his soul, was dying of AIDS, you know who shook his hand? Not his friends, not even my father, but Princess fucking Diana.

NORTON. You for real?

BAXTER. All in.

LENNY folds.

NORTON. What you doing that for?

BAXTER. When you got truth on your side there’s nothing to fear.

NORTON (throws in cards). Take it, motherfucker.

BAXTER. Thank you, thank you.

NORTON. Should get your son to write up soothsayer’s stories over here.

LENNY. Huh?

NORTON. He’s a writer isn’t he, your son?

LENNY. They’re more blueprints. For building stuff and the like.

NORTON. Maybe he could build a new boat and Windrush over here can re-live the memories of his childhood.

BAXTER. You’re just trying to throw me off my game.