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Award-winning Bradford director Javaad Alipoor Company is bringing Elmet, Fiona Mozley’s Booker Prize shortlisted novel, to life on stage. The production – fusing “the magical and the mythical of the ancient West Riding, via Cormac McCarthy, Ted Hughes and Sergio Leone” – is a highlight of Bradford’s City of Culture year.
Elmet is a powerful family story set in the wilds of Yorkshire. Image: Justin Sutcliffe
Set in the wilds of Yorkshire, the “gutsy, muscular staging” is told in Javaad Alipoor’s richly theatrical signature style. Commissioned by Bradford 2025, it will run at Loading Bay, pop-up city centre arts space converted from a warehouse.
Elmet features original music and live performance from The Unthanks, the acclaimed Mercury Music Prize nominated folk act whose music was in Peaky Blinders, with movement direction from Ad Infinitum’s Deb Pugh.
Cathy and Danny live with their Daddy in the West Riding on a land “made of myths”. Daddy is an undefeated bare-knuckle fighting champion, a towering man of muscle and bone who built them a home set apart from the world among the ash trees. Cathy is her father’s daughter, simmering with rage and restlessness, the soles of her feet black from running barefoot through the woods, whereas Danny, the younger teen, is happiest home-making.
Their days in the little copse in Elmet are spent peacefully, cutting boughs to make bows and arrows, hunting wood pigeons, rolling cigarettes for Daddy. Then Price, the all-powerful landowner, enters their world and with him the terrible discovery that the home they thought of as theirs is, in fact, his. Together the trio lead an uprising of the oppressed – the poorly paid, injured, evicted. But the briefest of victories is snatched from their grasp when a body is found in the woods.
An almighty reckoning threatens to smash apart everything that the little family holds dear. Vivid and visceral, lyrical and mythical, Elmet is an explosive story of family, revenge and the ultimate price of freedom.
Says Javaad Alipoor: “Elmet is made of the blood, bones, sweat and grit of West Yorkshire. At the heart of Fiona Mozley’s extraordinary story about identity and integrity, memory and myth, are three unforgettable characters: Danny, our narrator, Cathy, his intense, fiery sister, and Daddy, an elemental storm of a man. Theirs is a story of survival which culminates in an explosive collision of worlds. Elmet is dense, poetic, and muscular.
Acclaimed Bradford director Javaad Alipoor. Image: Piers Allardyce
“It takes on Bradford’s shape and atmosphere – a place of epic nature, incredible history and compelling stories. Our production will meld the magical and the mythical of the ancient West Riding, via Cormac McCarthy, Ted Hughes and Sergio Leone. I can’t wait to share it with audiences at Bradford 2025.”
Says Fiona Mozley: “Watching Javaad and the team bring my novel to life has been a truly remarkable experience. As soon as I met him, I knew he understood exactly what the book was about. His creative vision is both true to the work and something entirely new. When the story came to me in 2013, I never would have believed that it would one day be performed on a stage in Bradford. I can’t think of a better venue, nor a more talented, charismatic, inspiring group of people to devise and design it.”
Elmet offers “untimely warnings”, says Adrian McNally of The Unthanks. “In The Unthanks, we always try to put storytelling at the heart of our music, so moves into site specific theatre are light and enjoyable steps to take. For us, Elmet is a story of old morality from simpler times, sometimes pleasingly straightforward in way of life, but ultimately governed by fear and the warring powers of money, land ownership and physical strength. As the gap between the richest few and the rest of society continues to grow in the modern world, Elmet is full of timely warnings, seen through the childhood eyes of the innocent Danny and Cathy, and played out with a ruthlessness that takes the breath away.
“We are delighted to be part of bringing Fiona Mozley’s bold story to the stage, to be working with the brilliant Javaad Alipoor Company, creating new sound worlds and we’re looking forward to our time in Bradford, having enjoyed the city and landscape so much when we were last creating there.”
Shanaz Gulzar, creative director of Bradford 2025, adds: “This thrilling world premiere brings one of Bradford’s most talented contemporary theatre directors, Javaad Alipoor, back to the city where he grew up. Fiona Mozley’s bold story, with its echoes of Yorkshire fables from the Brontes to Ted Hughes, reimagined for the stage and enriched by the northern spirit of The Unthanks’ music, promises to be a deeply resonant and memorable theatrical experience.”
* Elmet is at the Loading Bay, Duke Street, from October 22 to November 2. Visit bradford2025.co.uk/event/elmet/
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