“How can that be? A great sin – a mortal sin – for which I must die and go to hell – but it made me free! For one moment I was free!’”
Today, we’re told that women can have it all. A career. A relationship. A family. A life of their own. Women can choose. But what happens when every choice comes with a price?
From the outside, Helen and her husband have a ‘happy marriage’. On the inside, Helen is beginning to realise that true freedom carries a devastating cost.
More than a story about one woman’s rebellion, Machinal exposes the systems that make us feel like we’re in control.
Inspired by the real-life case of convicted and executed murderer, Ruth Snyder, the play had its Broadway premiere in 1928 and is widely considered to be one of the great plays of the 20th century.
This production, set in modern day Tennessee against the backdrop of today’s rise of the ‘tradwife’, asks if, one hundred years later, anything has really changed at all?
Machinal is performed by graduating acting students and supported by technical students of Bristol School of Acting.
Directed by Lex Kaby
Design by Alice Sales
Lighting by Jenny Roxburgh
Music and Sound by Joseff Harris
Assistant Direction by Rhys Myhill
Dramaturgy by Jake Janaway
DATES: 19 – 21 NOVEMBER 2026
performances: 2:30pm and 7:30pm
RUNNING TIME: TBC
AGE RECOMMENDATION: 14+
VENUE: Bristol Old Vic – The Weston Studio
CONTENT WARNING: This production contains strobe lighting as well as themes of coercive marriage, misogyny, pregnancy and childbirth, postpartum depression, psychological distress, murder and execution. References to abortion.
