London Bubble Theatre Company: Bubbling up conversations

The pioneering London Bubble Theatre Company was founded in 1972 by performers and artists to create and promote inclusive community-based theatre. Its Playing Safe project, now in its sixth year, won the award for Outstanding Drama Initiative at the 2023 Music & Drama Education Awards. The forum theatre piece is designed for Year 6 pupils and seeks to get them talking about youth violence and safety in their community. London Bubble was praised by the judges for their commitment to using theatre to initiate social change.

Playing Safe was also commended by the MDEA panel for its ‘holistic approach’, working alongside parents, staff and the police to ‘directly support lesser-reached communities’. The initiative emerged after a leader in children's services at Southwark Council wanted to devise a project which would enable Year 6 children to talk more in depth about the knife crime and gang culture that had directly impacted local schools. Beginning with evidence from the Early Intervention Foundation's 2018 report and working with parents, school staff and the police, London Bubble practitioners devised the content for the play. During the summer of 2022, a team of three actors visited six Southwark primary schools and engaged with over 400 young people. This summer, they repeated this project.