Brighton Fringe 2026
Can’t Kill the Spirit
PlayGC Theatre Company
Genre: Theatre
Venue: The Lantern @ ACT
Festival: Brighton Fringe
Low Down
A former Greenham Common activist and her family grapple with the impact of her getting involved in a climate demonstration.
Review
When former Greenham Common activist Chloe gets involved in a climate demonstration, she knows that her choices may register at a national level, and change the course of her life – as well as affecting her family’s lives.
Can’t Kill the Spirit focuses on the intimate conversations within one family to explore a larger theme: a woman’s ability to stand up and champion what she feels is important – and how her choices may affect her future and those close to her.
This is an ambitious and sincere production that explores questions of conviction, solidarity, and the personal cost of standing by one’s beliefs. For audiences already emotionally connected to its themes, the play is likely to resonate strongly, particularly in the current cultural climate where questions of conscience and resistance carry renewed urgency.
The production approaches its subject matter with clear passion and commitment, and the cast work hard to bring energy and emotional weight to the material. There are moments where the emotional stakes begin to emerge, particularly in scenes of conflict and moral tension, and the play’s central concerns are never in doubt.
One of the production’s most effective devices is its recurring slideshow of photographs from Greenham Common, wider protest movements, and contemporary climate activism, accompanied by a carefully chosen musical backing track. Used as transitions between scenes, these sequences bring a sense of lived history and emotional continuity to the evening, grounding the play’s themes in real faces, bodies, and acts of resistance.
Similarly, the production is strongest when Chloe recalls her experiences at Greenham Common women’s camp.
Where the production could develop further, however, is in the specificity and depth of its character writing. Many of the characters feel shaped more by the ideas they represent than by distinct inner lives.
This is where the production would benefit from further development. A deeper redrafting process — particularly one that sharpens the individuality, motivations, and interpersonal dynamics of the characters — could significantly strengthen the emotional impact of the piece. At present, the story contains many important events, but comparatively little sense of transformation or discovery within the characters themselves. Allowing more ambiguity, vulnerability, or unpredictability into the writing could help the drama feel more lived and evocative.
That said, there is no doubt that Can’t Kill the Spirit comes from a place of genuine care and conviction. The production clearly seeks not only to tell a story, but to affirm values and create recognition for those who see their own principles reflected on stage. For some viewers, that sense of affirmation may itself be moving and meaningful.
With further development of the script and more space for the characters to emerge as fully dimensional people rather than symbolic positions, the production has the potential to become not only politically engaged theatre, but emotionally compelling theatre as well.
