2023

Hope has a Happy Meal

Written by Tom Fowler

Play Details

Context

Artistic Director
Vicky Featherstone

Co-Production
SISTER

Dates Performed

3 June 2023 – 8 July 2023
Jerwood Theatre Upstairs

Form

4-7 cast Beyond-linear narrative Episodic Original full length in English Starting Point

Play Details

Synopsis

Various locations, including a farmhouse, a basement, and a McDonald’s

Hope, returns to the People’s Republic of Koka Kola after a 24-year absence, hoping to reconnect with her estranged sister Lor and find her abandoned son, Mitch. Along the way, she becomes entangled in the lives of a waitress named Isla, a forest ranger named Ali, and a police officer named Wayne, who they end up holding captive in Lor’s basement.

The play explores themes of family, abandonment, redemption, and the struggle to find hope in a dystopian, corporate-controlled world. With a non-linear structure and elements of dark comedy and absurdism, “Hope Has a Happy Meal” presents a series of vignettes that slowly reveal the characters’ interconnected pasts and their desperate attempts to escape their circumstances.