We sat down with playwright Kerry Wright, who has written her debut play Kailey, premiering at Bradford Loading Bay on the 11th of September. This play is a comedy-drama of parental imprisonment, and what happens to the young people left behind. Inspired by Wright’s real-life teenage experience, this funny, searingly honest and bold new play lays bare the realities of trying to live a so-called ‘normal’ life when your parent is taken away. Get tickets here.
Set in Bradford, it tours to Loading Bay, Bradford; Blackpool Grand Theatre; Red Ladder Theatre; Hull Truck; Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough; Theatre41, York and The Civic, Barnsley, from 11 – 25 September.
Tell us a bit about Kailey?
KAILEY is a comedy-drama that follows 18-year-old Kailey as she tries to figure life out while her mum is in prison. It’s her first taste of real independence, navigating a new job, applying to uni, and messy nights out with her best friend Beth, until things start to spiral. It really explores the question of who looks after you when your parent goes to prison. Despite the serious topic, it’s really fun, colourful with lots of dance music!
How have rehearsals been going?
Rehearsals have been ace and I love watching the world come to life once again! The cast and team are just so brilliant and I’m so lucky to be in the room with such a talented bunch.
What do you want audiences to take away from the show?
I hope audiences leave feeling like they’ve had a cracking night out. But more than that, I want them to leave with questions. Questions about how we, as a society, treat vulnerable young people. How we listen to them, support them, or too often, fail them.
You’re based in Bradford – this year’s UK City of Culture – and are premiering the play there – how does that feel?
It’s honestly such an exciting moment for me. KAILEY was created in Bradford from the very first spark of the idea, the city has been at the heart of its journey. I was incredibly lucky to have the support of so many Bradford-based artists and organisations, including Bradford Producing Hub and Bradford Arts Centre, even in those very early days when there wasn’t even a script yet.
To now be opening the tour right here in Bradford, and as part of the City of Culture, feels like everything has come full circle. It’s a huge privilege to bring KAILEY home in this way and to share it with the community that helped shape it from the very beginning.
Where else are you excited to tour too?
I’m really excited to take KAILEY to a mix of places from community venues to more traditional theatre spaces. Each stop on the tour brings something different, and that’s what makes it so special.
For me, it’s so important that the show feels accessible and breaks down those barriers so that it reaches people who might not feel theatre is for them.
At the same time, performing in traditional theatres is powerful too, it says these stories belong in those spaces just as much as any other. I’m excited to see how different audiences connect with KAILEY, and to keep building those conversations across all kinds of communities.
Parental imprisonment is an under-represented story in the media – what was important to you to bring it to the stage?
Parental imprisonment is something that affects a lot of families, but it’s rarely talked about. For me, it was important to show what that experience feels like, especially for young people. There’s often so much shame and silence surrounding it, and it can be incredibly isolating. With KAILEY, I wanted to create a show where those experiences are seen and validated not sensationalised or judged. Also, I wanted to show the reality to people who haven’t experienced it, to help them understand what it’s really like beyond the headlines or stereotypes.
What does it mean to you as a writer to be able to tell a story that reflects your own on stage?
It means a lot. Telling a story that reflects parts of my own experience feels both powerful and vulnerable. There’s a rawness to putting something so personal out there, especially when it’s tied to complex feelings but I feel that there’s also strength in that honesty.
Writing KAILEY gave me the chance to reclaim the narrative for the first time in my life. So often, they are told from the outside looking in, through statistics, news headlines, or stereotypes.
Kailey is full of energy, messy and fun – how do you balance this side of the story with the political undercurrents?
That balance was really important to me. KAILEY is full of energy, chaos, and humour because that’s what real life is like even in the hardest times, people still laugh and still have fun. I didn’t want the story to feel heavy-handed or just focused on the trauma, because that’s not the full picture.
The political undercurrents are there, they’re part of Kailey’s world, whether she’s aware of them or not. But rather than making a statement through statistics or speeches, I wanted the politics to come through the lived reality; through the joy, the mess, the relationships, the choices she has or doesn’t have.