Production Company: Chalk Roots Theatre. Author: Simina Pitur. Producer: Justin Treadwell. Director: Saulius Kovalskas. Sound engineer: Raimundas Paulauskas. Composer: Gintė Preisaitė. Graphic designer: Justina Burškaitytė. Recorded at BonaFide studio with engineering by Brian Bogdanovic. Cast: James Viller, Jessica Kinsey, Laura Pujos, James Crouch, Shaun Chambers, Johny Gill, Káit Feeney, Alma Reising, Andrea Johannes.

SYNOPSIS:

„Lydia has come from nothing and enters a family of three. She is gifted. Articulate. New. High hopes are placed on her future. And yet she never reaches her destination.”

Lydia is a story of a young woman growing up, shaped entirely by the voices around her – from her mother and father, to her priest, to cuts of meat and a birthday cake. Told by an unseen presence, able to only whisper but not change anything, this audio drama explores how and why people end up living lives they never wanted to – and what it takes to rediscover the path forgotten.

Chalk Roots Theatre is a UK-based arts company. Originally formed of theatre artists, during the pandemic we expanded to both digital and audio work – drawing on the screen and radio experience of various members of the company to produce projects including Lydia. The script was chosen from over a hundred submissions to the company, and produced by an international team of collaborators – initially recorded in the UK, with a script written in Romania, music from Denmark and with the final cut assembled in Lithuania.

From the writer, Simina Pitur: „After years of writing poems at the kitchen table for my own amusement, Lydia came out of a desire to capture what it feels like to be a person traveling forward in time. At best, it's a collection of moments that place you on the edge of understanding something very important. At worst, it's being trapped in a story about a character that you will never meet, but whom you are desperately trying to figure out. Either way, there is great comfort to be drawn simply from paying attention to what is happening. I hope Lydia can serve as a reminder of it.”