The skriker - Caryl Churchill

'Long before that, long before England was an idea, a country of snow and wolves where trees sang and birds talked and people knew we mattered.'

Caryl Churchill's The Skriker is an extraordinary collision of ancient fairytale and fractured urban England. This edition of the play was published alongside its revival at the 2015 Manchester International Festival.

In a broken world, two girls meet an extraordinary creature. The Skriker is a shapeshifter and death portent. She can be an old woman, a child, a young man. She is a faerie come from the Underworld to pursue and entrap them, through time and space, through this world and her own.

The Skriker was originally produced at the National Theatre, London, in 1994. It was revived at the Royal Exchange Theatre, Manchester, in 2015, as part of the Manchester International Festival, starring Maxine Peake, directed by Sarah Frankcom and featuring specially commissioned music by Nico Muhly and Antony of Antony and the Johnsons.

Caryl Churchill has written for the stage, television and radio. Her stage plays include Owners (Royal Court Theatre Upstairs, 1972); Objections to Sex and Violence (Royal Court, 1975); Light Shining in Buckinghamshire (Joint Stock on tour incl. Theatre Upstairs, 1976); Vinegar Tom (Monstrous Regiment on tour, incl. Half Moon and ICA, 1976); Traps (Theatre Upstairs , 1977); Cloud Nine (Joint Stock on tour incl. Royal Court, London, 1979, then Theatre de Lys, New York, 1981); Three More Sleepless Nights (Soho Poly and Theatre Upstairs, 1980); Top Girls (Royal Court London, then Public Theater, New York, 1982); Fen (Joint Stock on tour, incl. Almeida and Royal Court, London, then Public Theatre, New York, 1983); Softcops (RSC at the Pit, 1984); A Mouthful of Birds with David Lan (Joint Stock on tour, incl. Royal Court, 1986); Serious Money (Royal Court and Wyndham's, London, then Public Theater, New York, 1987); Icecream (Royal Court, 1989); Mad Forest (Central School of Speech and Drama, then Royal Court, 1990); Lives of the Great Poisoners with Orlando Gough and Ian Spink (Second Stride on tour, incl. Riverside Studios, London, 1991); The Skriker (Royal National Theatre, 1994); Thyestes translated from Seneca (Royal Court Theatre Upstairs, 1994); Hotel with Orlando Gough and Ian Spink (Second Stride on tour, incl. The Place, London, 1997); This is a Chair (London International Festival of Theatre at the Royal Court, 1997); Blue Heart (Joint Stock on tour, incl. Royal Court Theatre, 1997); Far Away (Royal Court Theatre Upstairs, 2000, and Albery, London, 2001, then New York Theatre Workshop, 2002); A Number (Royal Court Theatre Downstairs, 2002, then New York Theatre Workshop, 2004); A Dream Play after Strindberg (Royal National Theatre, 2005); Drunk Enough to Say I Love You? (Royal Court Theatre Upstairs, 2006, then Public Theater, New York, 2008); Bliss, translated from Olivier Choinire (Royal Court Theatre, 2008); Seven Jewish Children - a play for Gaza (Royal Court Theatre, 2009); Love and Information (Royal Court Theatre Downstairs, 2012); Ding Dong the Wicked (Royal Court Theatre Downstairs, 2012); Here We Go (National Theatre, 2015); Escaped Alone (Royal Court Theatre Downstairs, 2016) and Pigs and Dogs (Royal Court Theatre, 2016).

'Unwholesome, hypnotic and born in the dark... spellbinding'