This May Hurt a Bit: NHB Modern Plays

A witty, tender, and occasionally surreal exploration of one family's experience of the National Health Service.

A month after stating “we will stop the top-down reorganisation of the NHS that has got in the way of patient care”, the government launched the biggest top-down reorganisation the service had seen in its 65-year history. Stella Feehily's play explores one family’s journey through the digestive system of the NHS, and asks: what is the prognosis for this much-loved institution? This May Hurt A Bit premiered in 2014, on a UK tour co-produced by Out of Joint, and Octagon Theatre, Bolton.

"Urgent, clever, anarchic... I defy anyone to leave without a renewed sense of pride in our greatest institution, and some serious concerns about its future." - Time Out (London)

"Surreal, hilarious and hard-hitting… as theatrically entertaining as it is politically committed." - Observer

"Urgently topical… a passionate defence of nationalised medicine and a call to fight for its preservation." - Guardian

Stella Feehily's plays have been staged at the Royal Court Theatre, Soho Theatre and Project Arts Centre, Dublin, among others. She was co-winner of the Susan Smith Blackburn Award 2007 for O Go My Man.