NT Connections Festival: No Regrets / Normalised

Full Description

Cavendish School and The East Sussex Young People Theatre perform in Day 1 of our 2025 Connections Festival, the National Theatre’s annual, nationwide celebration of new writing. 2025 is the Festival’s 30th year, and Trinity is proud to host 14 young companies in 2025 as part of its festival programme.

Schools and youth theatres across the country perform a new piece of writing developed for the programme at their home venues before visiting a festival theatre.

Each ticket gives you access to an evening of two one act plays, with a short interval in between. For all of our Connections 2025 performances, we are offering an option to buy tickets at a reduced price, full price or, if you are able to, a slightly higher price that helps subsidise our Creative Engagement work.

 

 

Cavendish School presents
No Regrets
by Gary McNair

Over the course of five years, playwright Gary McNair spoke to people at all stages and in all walks of life on the subject of regret. This play marks the results of those conversations.

A collection of scenes from the silly to the profound, that charts our relationship with the things we should have done but didn’t and the things we shouldn’t have done, but did.

Suggested age suitability: 14+

Content warnings:
• Strong language.
• Description of violence.
• Mention of alcohol and addiction.
• One scene of a mugging and stabbing.
• References to death.

 

 

The East Sussex Young People Theatre presents
Normalised
by Amanda Verlaque

How do you protect a memory against a homophobic bully, when the bully is your own brother?

When an environmental campaign is the catalyst for protecting an LGBTQIA+ shrine, a group of friends must confront what comes first – friends, or family. And as the stakes rise, the battle lines are drawn between being loyal, being an ally, and what does “normal” really mean anyway?

Suggested age suitability: 16+

Content warnings:
• Strong language.
• References to the death of a character (unseen, prior to the play starting) in a car accident, and themes of grief.
• References to and depictions of homophobia.
• Depictions of bullying.
• Depiction of drinking.
• At one point a character holds a knife, but does not use it.
• Suggestion that some characters vape.
• One character gets beaten-up (offstage, unseen) and returns bruised.