By Grace Hatchell
The Hope Theatre has announced the third week of its inaugural festival for queer women and non-binary artists
Some theatre programmes ease you in gently.
North Sapph-Fest has chosen a different route: lockdown obsession, an 18th-century lesbian romcom, theatrical cabaret, heartbreak, Hercules, XXL jorts and a dispute over who gets custody of the dildo.
Frankly, Grace respects a festival that gets to the point.
Running throughout August at The Hope Theatre in Islington, North Sapph-Fest is a new festival dedicated to work by queer women and non-binary artists. The newly announced Week Three programme adds four productions to the shows already confirmed for the festival’s first fortnight.
Cherston: Housemates, benefits and lockdown decisions
Emily Farley’s Cherston takes audiences back to 2020 and 2021, because apparently we have now reached the stage where lockdown is historical theatre.
Six people are forced to spend an unreasonable amount of time together. They are housemates. They are friends. Some may also be receiving additional benefits not included in the tenancy agreement.
As isolation begins to take its psychological toll, the characters become increasingly obsessed with one another. That obsession is simultaneously helping them survive and tearing the household apart.
The show explores limerence, breadcrumbing, toxic relationships and whether we value ourselves enough to be alone.
Grace remembers lockdown mainly as a period of staring suspiciously at banana bread and wondering whether standing two metres apart had finally improved British queuing.
For this particular household, however, it appears boundaries became less “carefully maintained” and more “left outside with the bins.”
The Adventurers: Sailors, widows and Venetian complications
Next comes The Adventurers by Autumn Shields, described as a campy lesbian romantic comedy set in 18th-century Venice.
Already, there is very little to dislike.
The story follows a cross-dressing sailor who returns from sea determined to marry an aristocratic widow. It sounds like a perfectly solid plan until a notorious libertine appears carrying a secret of his own.
There will presumably be disguises, seduction, thwarted intentions and at least one person dramatically entering a room as though they personally invented doorways.
Loosely inspired by Voltaire’s La Prude and Casanova’s memoir Histoire de ma vie, the production takes its historical influences and gives them a distinctly sapphic romantic-comedy twist.
That’s Just The Way It’s (un)Done: A queer Happily Never After
Rowan For Now brings the award-nominated autobiographical cabaret That’s Just The Way It’s (un)Done to the festival.
Blending theatre, cabaret and dance, the show examines the dangers of heteronormative conditioning and the journey towards queer fluidity.
It explores outgrowing old versions of yourself, shedding restrictive narratives and unravelling everything you once believed to be fixed or true.
The production calls itself a queer “Happily Never After.”
Which feels refreshingly honest. Happily ever after has always involved an unreasonable amount of pressure.
Sometimes the castle is draughty, the prince has terrible communication skills and the glass slipper gives you a blister.
Masc Off: Hercules, heartbreak and XXL jorts
Then we arrive at Masc Off by Julia Rogers.
The official description begins with a dildo custody battle, an obsession with Hercules and a love of big tits.
There is no graceful transition into that sentence, so Grace has decided not to attempt one.
Fresh from university and suffering after a brutal heartbreak, Masc spends her nights getting drunk on Canal Street with friends Jazz and Shy.
But beneath the drinking and chaos, buried trauma begins pushing through the seams of Masc’s XXL jorts. Her habit of avoiding communication—and her enthusiastic commitment to self-destruction—threatens her friendships, career and romantic life.
It sounds loud, funny and messy, but with something painful underneath. Much like many nights out
The jorts are clearly under enormous emotional and structural pressure.
A festival making room for queer stories
North Sapph-Fest is curated by The Hope Theatre and runs from 3 to 28 August.
The festival provides a platform for queer women and non-binary artists, with performances taking place in the theatre’s intimate 50-seat space above the Hope and Anchor pub.
The venue describes itself as a place where audiences and theatre-makers can explore big ideas through stories that are dramatic, surprising and connected to the world around us.
Week Three certainly seems to have understood the assignment.
Across four productions, the programme tackles isolation, desire, toxic relationships, identity, inherited expectations, heartbreak and trauma.
It also contains an aristocratic widow and contested ownership of an intimate object, because balance is important.
Grace’s early thoughts
There is a pleasing refusal to behave running through this programme.
Its characters are crossing boundaries, questioning the stories handed to them and making romantic choices that would cause serious concern among sensible relatives.
The work may be funny and camp, but it is not avoiding difficult territory. Behind the romcom plots, cabaret and jorts are questions about loneliness, self-worth, identity and the damage caused by forcing people into roles that never fitted them.
And, importantly, the programme does not appear interested in presenting queer lives as one long, tasteful learning opportunity.
People get drunk. People make bad decisions. People become obsessed with aristocratic widows.
Representation, at last, with room for absolute nonsense.
North Sapph-Fest — Week Three details
Venue: The Hope Theatre, 207 Upper Street, Islington, London N1 1RL
Festival dates: 3–28 August 2026
Performance times: 7pm and 8.30pm
Tickets: £16 and £18
Box office: 0333 666 3366
Week Three programme
Cherston
18–20 August at 8.30pm
The Adventurers
19–20 August at 7pm
That’s Just The Way It’s (un)Done
21–22 August at 7pm
Masc Off
21–22 August at 8.30pm
thehopetheatre.com/northsapphfest
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