The Value of Nothing

An interactive comedy play about the value of art in society.

Entrepreneur Vince Fine and his small team are launching Artworks, a new initiative to help get unemployed people engaged in making Art. Unfortunately for Vince, the launch is dogged by infighting among his team, surprise guests and the fact that his girlfriend is pregnant and upset...

What else could possibly go wrong?

Exploring issues of how society views those living on welfare benefits, the ‘creative industries’ and what we should value in life, this dark comedy (running in real time) charts the fall from grace of the central comedic hero, Vince Fine, as he watches everything he’s ever dreamed of slip from his fingers.
Includes some audience participation and interaction.

About the playwright

Kim is a writer and also a lecturer and Programme Leader for Creative Writing at Edge Hill University. Her plays include Joy With Child (2010) for Organised Chaos, The Loser (2009) at Camden People’s theatre as well as a range of plays for young people for Activ8 at Bolton Octagon, Lime Arts and Health, Lets Go Global and Mothers Against Violence, and Burnley Youth Theatre – including Polarised in 2003, the first play about the Burnley riots in 2001 and the first play she had ever written! In 2013 she was part of a North West co-operative of playwrights called the Alligator Club, creating pop-up theatre, and she co-wrote and curated Blackout at The Dukes in Lancaster and Pages From My Songbook at The Royal Exchange in Manchester. In 2014 she toured the first Laid Bare show, Project XXX, which she co-wrote with Paul Hine. In 2015 she was part of the Royal Exchange’s Next Stages group and was commissioned to write one of the monologues for the first Come Closer event, which was called Triple the Price of a Fruit Cake. She lives with her husband and two sons in Manchester.

About previous work

*Comedy values aside, this is a fresh and timely piece of exploratory theatre. Project XXX maintains that it did not intend to provide any answers but simply to ask the questions. *−Sarah Bloomer, What’s On Stage

*...This, of course, is all in keeping with the theme, and breathes life into the Lantern theatre space like no production I’ve seen there before. The multimedia element gave a dimension to the drama that really gave Project XXX a boost.  *−Vicky Andersen, Made Up in Liverpool

Project XXX is a disturbing look at an issue that’s becoming ever more relevant. With youngsters as young as 13 filming and distributing explicit imagery of themselves, Project XXX is trying to gain an understanding of why. −Martin Charlton, The Edge Chorlton