THIS REALLY IS TOO MUCH Announces National Tour

In their fun, feminist show This Really Is Too Much, Leeds based Gracefool Collective strut their stuff in business suits, sparkly dresses and bikinis to a brilliantly varied and often familiar soundtrack. A theatrical presentation where dancing and dark comedy combine to delve into a world of farcical stereotypes and preposterous power struggles, wrestling with gender, identity, control and social convention for an outlandish and wildly entertaining medley of absurd political speeches, talent contests and box ticking. Slickly choreographed, wildly entertaining, raucous, provocative and laugh-out-loud funny and positively dripping with feminist charm and anarchic wit.

In a year when #metoo, gender pay inequality and the feminist agenda has rarely been out of the headlines, 2018 is an especially appropriate time for Gracefool Collective to take their powerfully satirical Edinburgh festival hit This Really Is Too Much on an extensive national tour. Hometown audiences can see the show when it visits Stage@Leeds on Wednesday 17 October.

Raucous, provocative and laugh-out-loud funny, the four-piece have created a genre-busting show that reveals the downright absurd realities of life as a three-dimensional, high definition, water-drinking, salad-eating, moisturising W.O.M.A.N. in modern society.

'Gleefully compelling' (Exeunt), slickly choreographed and dripping with feminist charm and anarchic wit, This Really Is Too Much combines dance, dark comedy and theatre. An accessible and humorous exploration of gender inequalities the show delves deeply into a world of farcical stereotypes and preposterous power struggles, wrestling with gender, identity and social convention along the way.

After 100 years of women's suffrage in Britain how far have we really come in that time?

This Really Is Too Much is an outlandish, thought-provoking and wildly entertaining medley of absurd political speeches, talent contests, job interviews and box ticking. The four performers, Kate Cox, Sofia Edstrand, Rachel Fullegar and Rebecca Holmberg, fight themselves, each other and society's expectations for women to be individual, political, beautiful, popular, in control - and in their place.

'Laughing at systems of power or oppression in order to undermine the power they hold over us is one of the strongest forms of protest' said Rachel

Kate said 'Our aim is not to point fingers'. 'But to shine light on some of the ridiculous scenarios we observe in real life' added Sofia 'and to challenge how easily we accept these' concluded Rebecca.

Gracefool Collective is a four woman strong company of theatre makers formed in 2013. They make post-intellectual-pseudo-spiritual-feminist-comedy-dance-theatre about the absurdities of modern existence. They aim to provoke, delight, and defy convention through irreverent physicality, sharp writing and arresting characters. Their work tackles serious issues while never taking itself too seriously. www.gracefoolcollective.com

The four Gracefool's (collectively) say that 'This show is for anyone interested in dance, theatre, laughing, crying, feminism, gender, identity, smashing the system, ticking the boxes, beauty pageants, political speeches, salad, moisturiser, water, turtle necks, disco, Steely Dan and/or Barry White'.

See a short promotional video here

This Really is Too Much is supported through funding via CATAPULT (Llankelly Chase, Northern School of Contemporary Dance, Spin Arts and Yorkshire Dance), Northern Connections (Northern School of Contemporary Dance), CARP (Barnsley Civic), Dragon's Den (OneDanceUK) and Activate Performing Arts