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North of Providence was presented as part of a double bill of short plays by Edward Allan Baker, alongside Dolores. Conceived initially for live performance at the Wardrobe Theatre in Bristol, the production was reimagined during the pandemic as a fully staged livestream from a converted soundstage.

At the center of the production was an exploration of family—particularly the complicated and often unbreakable bonds between siblings. In North of Providence, the relationship between brother and sister becomes a confrontation with a shared history of dysfunction, resentment, abandonment, and love. Beneath their hostility lies an intimacy particular to siblings: the accumulated knowledge of where each other has come from, what each has endured, and the wounds a family can inflict and inherit.

The production recontextualized Baker’s Rhode Island working-class world within Sheffield, England, drawing a parallel between two communities historically shaped by steel. Against the political landscapes of Reagan’s America and Thatcher’s Britain, the play became an investigation into what happens to working-class families when the industries that have sustained their communities begin to disappear—and when political leadership fails the people whose lives depend upon them.

The pandemic ultimately transformed the theatrical language of the production. Created on a converted soundstage rather than in a conventional theatre, North of Providence occupied a space between theatre and film: performed live and continuously, while using the intimacy of the camera to bring the audience into the private spaces and emotional histories of Baker’s characters.

“Director Victor Lirio and Designer Carly Brownbridge have created a North of Providence that features splendid performances in both main roles and which packs a very considerable emotional punch.” - Mike Whitton, StageTalk UK