Whilst on-stage production receives glowing reviews, behind-the-scenes work raises awareness in schools and confidence in those with lived experience.
Sherman Theatre and Grand Ambition’s production of Rebecca Jade Hammond’s new play Hot Chicks has received four-star reviews and broad critical acclaim since its premiere in Cardiff last month. Whilst its run continues in Cardiff before a move to Swansea’s Grand Theatre, the education and engagement work running alongside the play is hitting full steam, with teams in both cities working with partners to engage young people with the issues in the play.
An unsettling and darkly comic play; Hot Chicks tackles one of the most urgent national crises of our times; child criminal exploitation. In developing the production, the creative team liaised with charities, social services and third sector organisations including CMET in Swansea, SAFE in Cardiff, Cascade Wales (Children’s Social Care Research and Development Centre) and YMCA Swansea. An Arts Council of Wales-funded education and engagement programme, borne of that research, is being delivered alongside the play to raise awareness of exploitation.
In Cardiff, Sherman Theatre’s Francesca Pickard has worked with freelance Outreach Facilitator Katie-Elin Salt to deliver a programme of creative workshops for young people developed alongside SAFE and with funding from Cardiff Council and the Youth Endowment Fund, bringing these young people into the theatre for the first time.
Swansea Grand theatre-based creative collective Grand Ambition have been working with staff at Swansea Council’s CMET (Contextual, Missing, Exploitation and Trafficking - Safeguarding Children and Young People in Swansea from Extra-Familial Harm) and YMCA’s YHub to support service users’ engagement with Hot Chicks, with weekly workshops at YHub exploring creative ways to express the emotions evoked by the piece.
Grand Ambition Engagement Director Michelle McTernan said:
“The contribution from CMET staff and service users has been invaluable. Our writer, Rebecca Jade Hammond and the play’s director Hannah Noone attended a young people’s panel and picked up lots of tips from them to help flesh out the characters and make them human and believable. The girls in the play speak like young people from Swansea, they dream about their future. .
“Members of the CMET Youth Panel, along with pupils from Morriston Comprehensive School and YHub users then came to the theatre to sit in on an early read-through of the script and to give us their feedback – they have really helped us to bring this story to life. It is important to us to represent voices less frequently heard on our stages. For all the attention county lines is currently receiving, there’s been very little in the media that gives voice to the young people affected. This a powerful story, with a razor-sharp, darkly funny script that sweeps you along, before bringing the reality of the situation many young people are facing painfully to light. We really hope that young people and their adults will come to see it. We believe that the arts have a valuable contribution to make in helping to highlight societal issues, and hope that Hot Chicks can do just that.”
Before starting rehearsals, the team consulted leading expert on Childhood Criminal Exploitation, Dr Nina Maxwell of Cardiff University, on the script. Dr Maxwell returned to see the production in Cardiff:
“This is a must-see production for practitioners working with vulnerable young people, for teachers, for parents of adolescents, and importantly for young people themselves to become aware of the temptation and traps of exploitation, and how ‘one job’ can escalate to a spiral of fear, coercion, violence, sexual exploitation and criminality.
“It would be wonderful to see this impactful play and its educational resource rolled out across Wales to inform young people and hopefully prevent them becoming victims themselves.”
The Hot Chicks Education pack has been created by Cardiff Curriculum Team Wellbeing lead, teacher Kate Martin. This bilingual resource to accompany the play will be available to all schools in Wales via Welsh Government’s Hwb network.
Playwright Rebecca Jade Hammond said:
“In recent years, cuts to youth clubs, community centres and closing of parks have made vulnerable young people easy targets for organised crime networks.
“More recently, there has been an increase in girls and young women playing key roles and it is those women I wanted to put front and centre of this play. Hot Chicks is about those young girls who fall through the cracks of education and society, forgotten.”
Hot Chicks was performed at Sherman Theatre in Cardiff 21 March-5 April 2025. It transfers to Swansea Grand Theatre 16-25 April 2025.