Khabaloush: New play at Contact Theatre includes special performances for women only audiences

Ms Diva Productions is a new Manchester-based theatre company formed by Farida Nazir and Hanneke Blower. They devise plays and workshops then take them out to the community, with a focus on women’s groups. The company was the brainchild of Farida, who realised that some women were unable to go to the theatre due to religious or cultural constraints.

Their play Khabaloush is currently showing at the Contact Theatre. Literally translated, it means expect the unexpected. A comedy-drama, it's based around a therapy session run by a flaky Reiki practitioner called Roxy. When her clients turn up, it soon becomes apparent that they are society’s misfits, destined to be brought together by a higher power. Even the seemingly respectable business woman Elaine is isolated within the world she inhabits.

Over the course of an evening, social niceties give way to inevitable tensions and as the recriminations fly, social and personal barriers are broken down and each woman experiences her own moment of redemption. Khabaloush takes an irreverent side-swipe at the world of alternative practitioners while questioning whether there is a deeper truth out there.

A women-only matinee of Khabaloush will take place at the Contact Theatre at 1.30pm on 29 April. It's expected to be attended by mostly Muslim women from communities within Manchester, many of whom will never have seen live theatre before.

Evening performances will take place from 30 April-2 May at 7.30pm in Space 2 at the Contact Theatre. The company will then take women-only workshops out to community centres in Manchester from 4 May-8 May.

Click below to hear the theme tune

Contact Theatre box office 0161 274 0600

www.contact-theatre.org