This powerful performance is full of raw emotion as it follows 14 care leavers on their journey, experiencing bewilderment, terror, liberation and anger as they are thrust into their new lives.
Many readers will have worked with every character on stage many times. Working day-to-day with the dramas of young people we can all start to normalise the most harrowing experiences. This play will come as a jolt to anyone who has slipped into that space.
Armour-plated against any connection with her clients, the leaving care worker in 365 is cringe-making in her responses and fades into irrelevance as the real lessons of independence take their toll. The characters are sketched rather than painted, but we are presented with just enough back story to make sense of the huge sense of loss and grief they feel as they find themselves alone and relive past abandonments.
From an almost unremittingly dark place, the performance finds hope in a gradual process of acceptance and adaptation. We are left with the impression that most will find their way as they discover and assert their identities as young independent adults. Somehow, out of overwhelming chaos and inevitability, there is a sense of possibility and of future.


