The Play Placing Ladies' Bathroom At Centre Stage.

The ability to pee in peace has grown to be a political issue. As broadsheet commentators do their column inches to stir up ethical panic around trans people the usage of public bathrooms, trans, and gender-non-conforming people face the very real threat of harassment and violence in lavatories on an everyday foundation. 

Such was the inspiration for the putting of writer and overall performance artist Travis Alabanza's new play, flooding, which explores friendship, feminism, and trans harmony all from the inner of a locked membership restroom.

The play gained a socially distanced debut at the Bush theatre in December, before tier four restrictions have been announced – however this week, it lower back for a great online overall performance, led by Reece Lyons.

Lyons performs Rosie, the protagonist of the only-female show, with such self-assurance that I discovered it hard to understand that this is her first foremost function in a degree production – and that the monologue she gives you turned into rehearsed over zoom. 

Her podium is around, white-tiled bathroom, accented with the aid of a playful pink bathroom and sink, a highlighter-yellow statue, and an electric powered-blue striking mirror. Grounded by way of chunky black document martens, Rosie steps up to the plate to share her circulation of recognition, with her memories often circling lower back around to matters which have passed off in toilets. 

The 22-yr-vintage Lyons, who brings sufficient electricity to embody a couple of characters, then proceeds to expertly command the room for 70 mins (aided by means of the route of Debbie Hannan).

There may be pleasure, comfort and unconditional unity to be found within the toilets – hair, make-up, and relationship advice, and compliments and luxury when you maximum need it. 

As Rosie tells us: “most effective a space as vital as the club bathrooms can obtain a hair salon, a photography studio, a therapist’s furniture and the complete beauty aisle of boots.”

But of the path, we see how bathrooms can also be locations characterized through risk and exclusion – notwithstanding the truth that, as Rosie stresses, cis and trans women are united by means of the violence they face from men. 

As the play is going on, the resounding message is ultimately approximately friendship, with Rosie's friend zee agreeing as a prime example of a chum that definitely permits her to exist. “the trans bit felt so unimportant while we were together.” she corrects: "or the importance turned into already acknowledged, so we should chat about something else.”