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“A powerful, thought-provoking piece of theatre…Lifers challenges our conceptions, and preconceptions, about crime, punishment, redemption and what ’justice’ really means.” –LondonTheatre1
Inside the walls of HMP Drummond, long-term prisoners Baxter, Norton, and Lenny pass the time with poker, banter, and the kind of gallows humor only lifers can muster. When Lenny’s body starts to give out, young prison officer Mark keeps an eye on him. What begins as a duty of care becomes an unexpected friendship, exposing the cracks in a system built to punish, not to support.
Darkly funny and unflinchingly honest, Evan Placey’s play Lifers challenges what we think we know about crime, punishment and redemption. Do some crimes make a second chance impossible? And when the world moves on without you, what does justice really mean?
“An inside look at the ageing prison population…authentically captures its setting and asks knotty questions about the state of the nation as well as its institutions.”
–Guardian
“Poignant, honest and affecting…a thought-provoking drama that pulls no punches.”
–The Stage
“A coruscating indictment of the prison system…beautifully written.”
–Broadway World
“Meticulously crafted, powerful yet accessible…absorbingly complex.”
–Everything Theatre
Evan Placey is a Canadian-British playwright who grew up in Toronto and now lives in London. His plays include: Lifers (Synergy Theatre Project at Southwark Playhouse, 2025); Peter Pan with Vikki Stone (Rose Theatre, Kingston, 2023); Jekyll and Hyde (National Youth Theatre, 2017 West End season); Consensual (National Youth Theatre, 2015 West End season); Girls Like That (Synergy/Unicorn Theatre; first produced and commissioned by Birmingham Repertory Theatre, Theatre Royal Plymouth and West Yorkshire Playhouse, 2013; winner of the Writers’ Guild Award for Best Play for Young Audiences); Banana Boys (Hampstead Theatre); Suicide(s) in Vegas (Canadian tour; Centaur Theatre Award nomination); Holloway Jones (Synergy Theatre Project/schools tour/Unicorn Theatre; winner of the Brian Way Award 2012 for Best Play for Young People; Writers’ Guild Award nomination); and Pronoun (National Theatre Connections festival, 2014), among others. His work for radio includes Mother of Him (BBC Radio 3/Little Brother Productions). Evan is a creative fellow and lecturer at the University of Southampton, and also teaches playwriting to young people for various theatres, and also in prisons.