Chicken Dust
by Ben Weatherill
by Ben Weatherill
Chicken Dust is a hard-hitting exploration of the human cost of the poultry industry, set on a chicken farm where new employee Tim confronts the grim reality of dying chickens and the struggles of his fellow workers.
About The Play
About The Play
Winner of the Curve Leicester’s Playwriting Competition and recently seen as a staged reading at the Finborough Theatre’s annual Vibrant – A Festival of Finborough Playwrights, the world premiere and full length debut of a new playwright.
A chicken farm in rural England. New boy Tim has just arrived for his first shift. The job is pretty simple: grab chickens seven at a time by their legs and ram them into cages for shipping. All of this in the dark, stomping around in ankle deep chicken shit, muck and mud. His teammates are old-timers, with cigarettes dangling from their lips and pantyhose up their arms to protect their skin. Feathers cling to clothes. This band of survivors don’t want much: just to stay in the countryside, catch the chickens, and earn the best living they can.
But the chickens are dying, rotting from the inside out like hot fruit just hours after they arrive. As disease spreads and pressure mounts, enter Oscar, the meticulous poultry inspector…
A hard hitting exploration of the human cost of our enormous appetite for cheap meat.
Chicken Dust won the Curve Leicester Playwriting Competition, whose judges included Finborough Theatre Artistic Director Neil McPherson, and was also supported by IdeasTap, Writing East Midlands and BBC WritersRoom. The play has been developed through Curve’s annual Inside Out programme and festival, created and curated by Associate Director Suba Das, and dedicated to nurturing the very best talent from the region. The play was further developed by the Finborough Theatre in a staged reading at Vibrant 2014 – A Festival of Finborough Playwrights.