Punishment Acts was a co production between Rideout (Creative Arts for Rehabilitation) and B arts, working in association with Expert Citizens. The project was a public performance that formed a key part of the Staging Justice research programme.
We received additional funding from Royal Central School of Speech and Drama to fund the recording of the production so it could be shared more widely. Junction15 filmed it beautifully and we are delighted to be able to make it available to watch here.
Content note: strong language, reference to substance abuse, and discussion of child loss.
Punishment Acts: Tales of Retribution, Reparation, and Redemption
Nights are long in prison. The minutes drag by for both the watched and the watchers like a dirty mop on a dirty floor. Tales are told, secrets shared, rumours whispering under the doors, down the pipes, leaking through the locks. In that hinterland between sleep and wakefulness, the timeline of history buckles and twists as the past and present begin their endless dance: the smell of a vape, the splash of the slop out, the taste of gruel, the ache of the treadwheel, the creak of the hangman’s rope.
The nights are long in prison for those who are out of time. How long is long enough?
Punishment Acts draws on the ideas of people with lived experience of multiple disadvantage including custody. Made following a series of workshops with Expert Citizens exploring themes in Discipline and Punish by the French philosopher Michel Foucault, it will ask audiences to reflect on beliefs about punishment and consider whether there are other ways to achieve ‘justice’.
Staging Justice 
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