What’s On: Jade City at The Bunker, London Bridge

A play that aims to tackle the devastating effect of poverty and the lack of opportunities faced by so many in Britain will be on for a run at The Bunker in London Bridge from September 3-21.

Jade City follows two friends struggling with the pressures of everyday life in modern Belfast.

Inspired by a city that is straining under the weight of decades of political and social unrest, Alice Malseed brings to life the mental health issues faced by the brushed aside working classes.

One third of people in Northern Ireland live on or below the bread line, and the country has seen more suicides since the Good Friday Agreement than deaths during the Troubles.

As the Government works to bring the 18-month deadlock in Northern Ireland to a close, Jade City explores the consequences of non-functional and uncaring governments and the effects on the people they have neglected.

Writer Alice Malseed said: “Jade City was written as a matter of urgency.

“It seeks to illuminate the effect that decades of austerity and economic and societal side-lining has had on masculinity, particularly in working class communities such as the one in east Belfast in this story.

“It is full of the storytelling, generosity, kindness and dark humour of Belfast; things that provide joy in Sas and Monty’s world.

Jade City has a lot of aggression and a lot of heart.

“For me, that’s Belfast.

“The play has a really live energy, that fizzes and buzzes in the dialogue until it explodes with devastating consequences.”