Tobacco Road

Incognito Theatre Company, winners of the Les Enfants Terribles’ 2018 Greenwich Partnership Award, return to London to make their VAULT Festival debut with their sell-out success Tobacco Road. They bring their unrelenting energy and cinematic physical style to the story of London’s criminal underworld as the country emerges from the shadow of the Great War.

Five resourceful young men and women try to find fame and wealth even as staying alive poses problems in a cutthroat society of thugs and conmen. Incognito’s explosive physical choreography takes the audience on a fast-paced and thrilling journey from pickpocketing in murky back streets to fixed boxing matches in dark basements.

This unique gangster story explores the stories never told in history books with every character being based on a real person or people. Elsie and Freda are inspired by the ruthless female gang, Alice Diamond and her followers. Tommy Carlisle is based on the bare-knuckle boxers of Lambeth, Alfie on the thousands of young men left deeply tormented by the effects of World War I, whilst the ambitious Felix is inspired by the bloodthirsty young men who were driven to succeed by their unerring determination.

Interrogating a strait-jacketed experience of gender, this thrilling production considers the complex and impossible standards of traditional masculinity while exploring the necessary violence of an implacable female gangster rising through a male-dominated society.

Tobacco Road is a magnified examination of the real people who forged a life for themselves in a world that had scorned them as disposable. By shining a light on gang activity, Tobacco Road investigates how young people continue to find themselves embroiled in gang culture and why it can sometimes feel as though there is no other option.