London Road

In late 2006 the everyday life of the quiet rural town of Ipswich was shattered by the discovery of the bodies of five women.

The residents of London Road had struggled for years with the soliciting and kerb-crawling that they frequently encountered. As Steve Wright, the occupant of No. 79, was arrested, charged and then convicted of the murders, the immediate community grappled with the media frenzy and what it meant to be at the epicentre of this tragedy.

London Road is a verbatim-theatre musical based on those events, with book and lyrics by Alecky Blythe, who recorded extensive interviews with the people of Ipswich, and music by Adam Cork, whose score is a response to the melodic and rhythmic speech patterns captured on those recordings.

The musical was developed by the National Theatre, London, and first performed there in the Cottesloe auditorium in April 2011. It won the 2011 Critics' Circle Award for Best Musical.

London Road is an experimental and challenging work which reveals the ways in which even the darkest experiences can engender a greater sense of our mutual dependence.

'This miraculously innovative show finds a new way of representing reality [and] opens up rich possibilities for musical theatre'— Guardian

'An astonishing document about a beleaguered yet resilient community... a startling, magically original success'— Evening Standard

'The most genuinely interesting and innovative new musical I've seen for ages'
— WhatsOnStage

Best Musical, Critics' Circle Theatre Awards

“'the most genuinely interesting and innovative new musical I've seen for ages' Michael Coveney”

'This miraculously innovative show finds a new way of representing reality [and] opens up rich possibilities for musical theatre'

'An astonishing document about a beleaguered yet resilient community... a startling, magically original success'

'The most genuinely interesting and innovative new musical I've seen for ages'

Alecky Blythe founded verbatim-theatre company Recorded Delivery in 2003. The company's first production, Come Out Eli, premiered at the Arcola Theatre, London, and later transferred to the BAC (winner of the Time Out Award for Best Performance on the Fringe).Other work includes: All the Right People Come Here (New Wimbledon Theatre); Strawberry Fields (The Courtyard, Hereford); Cruising (Bush Theatre, London, 2006); The Girlfriend Experience (Royal Court Theatre, London, 2008; Young Vic, London, 2009); I Only Came Here for Six Months (KVS and Les Halles, Brussels); Do We Look Like Refugees?! (National Theatre Studio / Rustaveli Theatre, Georgia, at Assembly Rooms, Edinburgh Festival Fringe, 2010; winner of Fringe First Award); London Road, with music composed by Adam Cork (National Theatre, London, 2011 and 2012; winner of Best Musical, Critics' Circle Awards); Little Revolution (Almeida Theatre, London, 2014) and Our Generation (National Theatre / Chichester Festival Theatre, 2022).For television she has written A Man in a Box (IWC and Channel 4); The Riots: In Their Own Words (BBC2).For film she has adapted London Road into a feature (BBC Film, BFI, National Theatre).

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