Drama on the Campus

Following the performance on April 9th of Unlocking Warwick’s re-enactment of Victorian cases, the drama is to be staged again at Warwick University on April 29th, with students taking some of the roles. The half-hour play, using real cases heard in Warwick in 1851, will be part of the University Open Day when potential students and their parents have a look round and meet teaching staff and existing students. 

The re-enactment is part of a collaboration between Unlocking Warwick’s research group and students learning about Victorian justice. The audience will be encouraged to join in with noisy reactions to the evidence and sentences, as they would have done in the mid-19th century when the Petty Sessions were a popular entertainment. 

The first performance of the play in the ballroom of the Jury Street Court House was clearly enjoyed by a packed house. Some of the audience found themselves accused of drunkenness or affray and sentenced to the stocks or the House of Correction. There was prominent coverage of the drama in the Leamington and Warwick Courier. Its Victorian predecessor, the Warwick Advertiser, had been the source of much of the material for the play. A lot of the dialogue used was taken from the verbatim reports in the paper. 

The performance at the university campus will be at 2.30pm on Friday 29th April at the School of Law.