work.txt (Modern Plays)

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Nathan Ellis said, "I wrote the show as a sort of satire of the always-on, never-stopping work culture, and then the whole world stopped because of COVID. As the pandemic recedes, it's fascinating and depressing to see how the energy of just-getting-going-again is mirrored by the play. I hope work.txt asks big questions about why we're all working so hard, and if we can't imagine a different sort of relationship to work. The show is about community and working together and play - it literally doesn't happen without the audience, so I'm thrilled it's happening in-person again at the Soho Theatre. I'm excited to get to work."

Unsettling yet brutally honest, Sung Im Her's Nutcrusher invites us to contemplate the sexual objectification of women, and question how we view our own bodies. Read our full review here. Photo: Ok Sang Hoon The indistinctness of work in modern society does not simply result in ‘working too much’ but in a deeper problem that creates the need to overwork. As our work becomes less visible, we feel that we are not working enough, must work harder. Simultaneously, the fruits of our labours become increasingly obscured, making it more difficult for us to recognise the value in our work. The audience read a projected text together out loud, with lines assigned by categories ("people with brown hair", "people who earn more than thirty thousand pounds a year"), follow instructions onstage and are fed lines by headphones as part of a collective, interactive experience. Nominated for an Innovation Award at VAULT Festival 2020, work.txt is written by Nathan Ellis who was previously a member of the Royal Court Invitation Writers' Supergroup 2018-19 and in 2020 was shortlisted for the Verity Bargate Award.

work.txt is a play with no actors that shines a light on the pointlessness and mundanity of modern work culture

Nathan Ellis is a writer for stage and screen. In 2020 his play Super High Resolution was shortlisted for the Verity Bargate Award run by the Soho Theatre, coming in the top six out of 1500 submitted plays. His plays include No One Is Coming to Save You (a 'blazing debut' (the Guardian), published by Oberon) and work.txt (**** the Guardian). In 2021, he made Still Life, a digital play series commissioned by Nottingham Playhouse. He has TV projects in development with Greenacre Films and Balloon Entertainment. He is represented by Giles Smart at United Agents and is based between London and Berlin. I struggled for a long while over whether work.txt was a successful reconception of work. There is a deceptiveness to the whole set up that that made it hard for me endorse its vision. I felt like it was out to get me. But in the weeks since, trying to piece together my own conception of what work I wanted to do, what I felt to be ‘good’ work, I found that the act of reconception is itself a spur to further reconception, and my own dissatisfactions with what work.txt did and how it worked were necessary and intentional. Look at Me Don’t Look At Me tells the story of a fierce, courageous woman, and asks questions about how we tell the stories of women from history. Read our full review. Photo: Sebastian Hinds Sami Ibrahim's latest show is a captivating story depicting the callousness of our immigration system. Ultimately, the performances in Violent Burst... compose a powerful odyssey of both humour and moving sentiment. Read the full review here. Photo: Conor Jatter

Finally, if you had to sell Super High Resolution to us in just a sentence or two, what would you say? Since the start of the pandemic people have been feeling more disconnected, unsure of what to do, how to behave, and how to do small talk, so it is a relief to form a group with strangers without the pressure of actually having to invent anything. Unlike awkward audience participation where one has to improvise, here you can hide behind the lines that are already written for you. When did writing itself come into your life? And when did you realise it was something you wanted to do for a living?Thank you so much for taking the time to talk to The Upcoming about your new play, Super High Resolution. What can you tell us about the play and what can audiences expect?