Heart of a Guardian – HEART Centre, Headingley

Writer: Libby Wattis

Director: Jeremy Stockwell

This was a highly unusual, but ultimately rewarding, evening. The Headingley Enterprise and Arts Centre, for a start, is a terrific community resource, tucked away in a cul de sac in Headingley’s student district which was packed out in early evening with those who found it helpful to have a few drinks before England faced up to Norway. It offered a welcome respite, with its bar, garden and rooms on three floors where all sorts of community activities take place during the day.

Then the play was almost the antithesis of theatre: a room with maybe thirty chairs, eight of them occupied by the time the play started, no set, a single chair and Libby Wattis sitting alone in the corner before the start. Periodically the noises of some class in the centre broke into Wattis’ script which consisted of well-chosen events delivered in a mostly matter-of-fact fashion, with scenes acted out from time to time. As a performer Wattis created character neatly enough, with welcome hints of accents, even if the splendidly realised little girls stayed little for rather a long time.

Wattis told her story simply and it is there that the effect of the evening lies. She assumes the role of Sue, a retired nurse married to Ian, a bluff ex-teacher. Their world turns upside down with a phone call that tells them that Tina, their daughter, has suffered a violent breakdown through drugs. They immediately take charge of the two little girls (aged 10 and 8) of her relationship with Michael who is no longer on the scene.

So far, so (relatively) straightforward, but the meat of the story lies in what happens next. The girls are understandably reserved, keen to return to their mother, though later on they admit that Tina’s suicidal attempts are nothing new, but gradually accept their grandparents as their carers.

What other problems present themselves, aside from the major one that, when the girls reach maturity, the grandparents will be pushing 80? Social services are presented more as an obstacle than a help, culminating in the appalling sequence of events where Tina phones accusing Sue of stealing the girls in a foul-mouthed rant that threatens coming to get them back. Sue finally rings the number of the dedicated Kinship Team, only to be told no such team exists.

Three forms of kinship caring exist, only one of which carries a financial reward. The others are at the local council’s say-so and they said no to Sue. So financial hardship (relatively) goes along with the elements of fear and self-blame. However, Sue ultimately discovers a Kinship Carers’ Support Group which offers exactly that, plus the realisation that Sue and Ian are luckier than some of the Food Bank-frequenting members of the group.

Jeremy Stockwell’s direction is minimal, Libby Wattis’ performance as Sue understated (a neat touch is consulting the pile of notes which Ian insisted she write so that she forgets nothing), but the evening generates its own power, forcing us to consider the unexpected ways in which the lives of Kinship Carers change and the love that operates outside of the system.

The play is repeated at HEART Centre on 18th July 2026