There is a warning on the screen above the stage: “This play is short, sharp and shocking.” It’s a reference to the promise of Margaret Thatcher’s government to give young offenders a “short, sharp shock” at detention centres, supposedly deterring them from crime. As Mike Kenny’s new play demonstrates, the experience was certainly sharp and shocking, but its impact on those detained was far from short.
Bad Lads is created from a story by Jimmy Coffey and the testimonies of the Medomsley men held at the youth detention centre, channelling the brutal ordeals of countless young men into a single fictitious character in the 1980s. After taking a joyride on a milk float, 17-year-old Jackie is sentenced to three months at Medomsley, where he is soon subject to horrifying cruelty at the hands of the staff, enduring a relentless pattern of violence, humiliation and sexual abuse.
