Clean Break was set up in 1979 by two women prisoners who believed that theatre could bring the hidden stories of imprisoned women to a wider audience. Still the only women’s theatre company of its kind, Clean Break has remained true to these roots, and they continue to inspire playwrights and captivate audiences with their groundbreaking plays on the complex theme of women and crime.
Their theatre-based education and training programme is integral to their ethos. For more than three decades, they have delivered high-quality theatre-based courses, awarded qualifications and offered specialist support, all of which are critical for the rehabilitation of women with experience of the criminal justice system. Run in prisons and from their women-only building in Kentish Town, their training and education programme helps participants to develop personal, social, professional and creative skills that often lead to education and employment.
Clean Break’s women-only identity is crucial to their rationale. The treatment of women by the criminal justice system is one of the clearest demonstrations that their society is still unequal and that women are judged by different standards to men. Most women offenders have experienced male violence and are victims of crime, yet first-time women offenders are twice as likely as men to be sent to prison. Their vision is of a society where women are neither unjustly criminalised nor unnecessarily imprisoned, and they believe that theatre enables women to challenge their oppression by society in general and by the criminal justice system in particular.
Clean Break uses theatre to keep the subject of women in prison on the cultural radar, helping to reveal the damage caused by the failures of the criminal justice system. Through their unique repertory of new plays and their education programmes, they raise difficult questions, inspire debate, and help to effect profound and positive change in the lives of women with experience of the criminal justice system.
