Breathless

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However, something looms over her life that she can’t bear to let go of – the vast collection of designer clothes that takes up every spare inch of her new flat. The urge to hold onto these items that she sees as an extension of herself is all-consuming, but she also really wants to invite her new girlfriend over. Right there is the support everyone coming out needs from their parents, and it was these words from her mother that sees Sophie on her first date with a woman – Jo. Even the samples themselves were no longer a guaranteed adrenaline boost; she once left a Merchant Archive sale with two jumpsuits near-identical in design, afterwards breaking down in distress knowing "I shouldn’t have done it”. Plesance Theatre Trust and Theatre Royal Plymouth are delighted to bring Breathless by Laura Horton, Plymouth Laureate of Words, to Theatre Royal Plymouth and Edinburgh Festival Fringe. I wrote a play based on my experiences and took it to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. Breathless ended up winning the coveted Fringe First award and now it’s touring. Somehow by accepting the reality of my situation, and working to clear my life of things, I’ve ended up being more aligned to the person I bought those clothes for in the first place.

Laura Horton’s poignant comic monologue “Breathless,” part of the Brits Off Broadway festival at 59E59 Theaters, finds Sophie at a breaking point. Played by Madeleine MacMahon, who gives her a nervous likability, Sophie would seem to have arrived at a joyous time in life. In her late 30s, she has a thoughtful, interesting new girlfriend, Jo, whom Sophie can envision as a long-term partner. Yet at the end of every date, she fabricates reasons Jo can’t come into her apartment. I always wanted to be a barrister or a hairdresser, so something where I argue my creative corner I suppose. But I've always loved clothes and my Mum runs a dress agency in the Cotswold town I grew up in (shout out to The Attic, Chipping Campden) and I think she has the best job ever. So maybe I'd beg her for some blatant nepotism.Here at TRP we couldn't be happier to be transferring BREATHLESS into the Soho Theatre, following its massive success at the Fringe last year. BREATHLESS is a homegrown show that was conceived and developed through our artists development programmes. It speaks to our ambitions to make exciting new work in Plymouth that we can share across the country. Laura's writing is tender, funny, and quietly powerful. The play has moved and delighted audiences across Plymouth and Edinburgh and will continue to resonate wherever it goes." Ben Lyon-Ross Head of Artist Development Breathless is a beautifully written monologue performed by Madeline MacMahon and written by Laura Horton.

The Guardian: Breathless review – a hoarder of clothes begins dating a minimalist | Edinburgh festival 2022 | The Guardian Heading to Soho Theatre following its Fringe First winning run in Edinburgh, Breathless is a funny, honest and stylish exploration of the knife-edge of hoarding, from the joy to the addiction and suffocating shame. From Laura Horton's (Plymouth Laureate of Words) own experience of clothes hoarding. What happens when the things we covet hide us from ourselves? Groundbreaking Autistic-Led Production of “A Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time” at A Common Thread Theatre Company in Framingham, MA 21st October 2023 Laura Horton is a writer and the current Plymouth Laureate of Words, the first playwright Laureate. Her plays include: Labyrinth Diet at The Space, OFFCOMM winner; Breathless, Pleasance at Edinburgh Fringe, 2022, winner of a Fringe First, Pleasance and Theatre Royal Plymouth Partnership, Popcorn and BBC Writer’s Room finalist, Holden Street and Scottish Mental Health Awards shortlist. Breathless was staged at Soho Theatre in 2023 and will be in New York as part of Brits Off Broadway until 7th May 2023. Short plays include: Come to Where I’m From, commissioned by Paines Plough; Giddy Tuppy, TRP and The Space; Bloody Men, Minituarists at The Arcola and TRP; This I Believe, Downstage Write at Exeter Phoenix and TRP. I will end this piece by adding that as a writer and lover of fashion, Laura dreamed of writing for Vogue, and thanks to this new play, Laura was invited to write an article covering the topic of hoarding which can be found online.Why couldn’t I part with all this stuff? It felt like I was letting my dreams go, when in truth, if I could remove items, I’d be making space for things to happen. I did still love shopping, and I think I always will, but trying to organise and throw things away… not so much.

All these pretty things were coming in,” Mandi said, “but they weren’t bringing me pleasure any more.”Nice to MITEM you: the 10th edition of the Madách International Theatre Meeting Opens in the Hungarian Capital 27th September 2023 As a depiction of bisexuality and queer experience, Breathless is nuanced and honest. In Stephanie Kempson’s well-paced and absorbing production, MacMahon plays Sophie and the other characters with an impressive clarity and precision. Her mild West Country accent works for the scenes with her Mum, who lives in Plymouth, and she uses other accents effectively for other characters. Verity Standen’s music accompanies the character’s emotional world and the simple set avoids literalism. First seen at the Theatre Royal in Plymouth last year, and successful at Edinburgh, this is a welcome London transfer for a show that, while admittedly a bit slender, is nevertheless both heartfelt and heartwarming. The female monologue is a well-established contemporary theatre form, but often the content is predictable and sometimes clichéd. No such doubts come to mind with Laura Horton’s latest play, Breathless, a semi-autobiographical 70-minute account of hoarding clothes. Horton describes herself as having been “on the knife-edge” of compulsive collecting, in denial for a long time because of media portrayals of the condition are so extreme. Her one-woman show explores an original subject with an impressively tight control over language and storytelling. And it has its funny moments too.