Mikron Theatre To Premiere 'A Force To Be Reckoned With'

Mikron Theatre is thrilled to announce that it will be premiering playwright Amanda Whittington’s new play ‘A Force To Be Reckoned With’ which explores the story of the pioneering women of the British Police force.

The new play will open at Marsden Mechanics Hall on 13th May and then tour nationally by canal, river and road until 21st October including a performance at the Greater Manchester Police Museum & Archives.

More Heartbeat than Happy Valley, ‘A Force to be Reckoned With’ is an arresting story which captures a century of change.

With handbag, whistle and a key to the Police Box, WPC Iris Armstrong is ready for whatever the mean streets of a 1950s market town throws at her.

Fresh from police training school, she prepares for her first day on the beat. The reality is quite different. Stuck at the station, she soon finds her main jobs are typing and making brews.

Iris joins forces with fellow WPC Ruby Roberts. They’re an unlikely partnership. A two-girl department, called to any case involving women and children, from troublesome teens to fraudulent fortune tellers.

What starts as ‘women’s work’ soon becomes a specialist role. Iris finds she’s earning her place in a historic force to be reckoned with.

Along the way, she discovers the Edwardian volunteers who came before her, a lineage of Suffragettes-turned-moral enforcers and the secrets that the police box hides.

The production’s cast of actor/musicians will feature Eddie Ahrens (Monopoly Lifesized, Selladoor/Gamepath Entertainment), Hannah Baker (The 39 Steps, OVO Theatre), Harvey Badger (Spring Awakening, Stratford Circus Arts Centre) and Rachel Hammond (The True Adventures of Marian and Robin Hood, Barn Theatre and Swallows and Amazons, York Theatre Royal).

‘A Force to Be Reckoned With’ is directed by Gitka Buttoo (Road, Oldham Coliseum), designed by Celia Perkins, with musical composition by Greg Last (The Borrowers and The Rise and Fall of Little Voice, Theatre by the Lake and musically directed and composed by Dan McGlade (Macbeth and Twelfth Night, Leeds Playhouse).

Amanda Whittington

Amanda Whittington is one of the most widely performed playwrights in the country and was delighted to make her Mikron debut with Atalanta Forever in 2021. She’s done the maths and discovered she’s written 40 plays over the years, including ‘Be My Baby’, ‘The Thrill of Love’, ‘Kiss Me Quickstep’ and most recently, the third in her Ladies trilogy, ‘Ladies Unleashed’;. Amanda’s published by Nick Hern Books and her work for Radio 4 includes seven series of the award-winning D for Dexter and The Archers.

Playwright Amanda Whittington said about her new play:
“I’m delighted to be back at Mikron in their 51st year with A Force to be Reckoned With. The play takes a light-hearted look at the lives of Women Police Constables in the 1950s, celebrating their spirit, optimism and heroic efforts to break the glass ceiling without a truncheon.”

Based in the village of Marsden, at the foot of the Yorkshire Pennines, the company are like no other. For starters, over the last 51 years they have toured 68 productions on board a vintage narrowboat and spent over 37,000 boating hours on the inland waterways. Secondly, they perform their shows in places that other theatre companies wouldn’t dream of; a play about growing-your-own on an allotment; a play about bees performed next to hives, a play about fish and chips to audiences in a fish and chip restaurant, as well as plays about hostelling performed in YHA Youth hostels and the RNLI, performed at several Lifeboat Stations around the UK. Over the last 51 years the company has performed 5,300 times to over a staggering 440,000 people.

‘A Force to be Reckoned With’ will be touring nationally in the Summer alongside Poppy Hollman’s new play ‘Twitchers’ which takes us on a flight through RSPB history, feathered with birdsong and laughter.

w50[For tour dates and information on A Force to be Reckoned With visit http://mikron.org.uk
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