Our now regular Pay What You Decide Autumn season takes a trip on the Brexit train, and then curls up under a warm duvet. Before all that join us for Emergency — while ongoing austerity says go small, we’ve gone big with some 30 performances in just the one day… To keep in touch, sign-up for our Weekly Warning e-mail.

Brought to you by hÅb — with Sustained Theatre Up North, Z-arts, The Lowry — we look forward to seeing you at some or all of Autumn/Winter 2018. If you want to check out what happened last season take a look at our Spring/Summer 2018 archive, and if you came to an event please help us by taking a few minutes to fill out our online survey.

What is Word of Warning + where did it come from?

Consistently refreshing and surprising, no season is ever the same…

Simply put, Word of Warning is a one-stop shop for the bonkers, the beautiful and the bizarre of new live performance — an attempt to keep alive the best of the 25 year greenroom legacy, and to introduce new people to the possibilities of seeing live work in Manchester + beyond…

…a strand of alternative and fledgling work that has only recently got a new lease of life via Word of Warning and Emergency.
Creative Tourist on Manchester theatre (November 2014)

We take live work very seriously — but we don’t take ourselves seriously at all. Over the past 6½ years we’ve shown funny, thought-provoking, beautiful work by the likes of FK Alexander, Jo Bannon, Richard DeDomenici, Eggs Collective, Nic Green, Ria Hartley, Stacy Makishi, Kim Noble, Deborah Pearson, Darren Pritchard, Proto-type Theater + Greg Wohead, amongst others. We’ve also created bonkers all ages live art (Haphazard), hosted Hunt & Darton’s pop-up art-café, unleashed bizarre behaviour upon Manchester’s city centre (Hazard), and created performance festivals in blocks of flats (Domestic).

Curated by the ever-impressive Word Of Warning…
The Guardian’s Lyn Gardner, on Domestic (November 2013)

Who’s it for? Anyone looking for a different night (or day) out.

We don’t want to put you off by talking labels — yes there’ll be theatre, live art, dance — the aim is to be anything but elitist or po-faced. So if you like comedy, music, gaming or just a friendly, stimulating evening — there’ll be something you might want to take a chance on.

What our audiences have said about the work

• Astonishing. Like nothing else. Transformative, immersive, moving.
• Brave, dark, humerous, intimate, intense.
• Heartwarming, funny + engaging.
• Strangely mesmeric. A unique experience.
• Very enjoyable — felt accessible and thus enjoyable to all.
• You programme wonderful, daring performances that I have never been disappointed by.

Who is Word of Warning?

My name’s Tamsin Drury and I run an organisation called hÅb, which was greenroom’s partner for over a decade. You might not know hÅb but you might know some of our events — like Emergency (Manchester’s free marathon of live work, now in its nineteenth year) and Hazard (biennial random sprees of eccentricity in Manchester’s City Centre).

I’ve been around a while, a really long while… and in that time, I’ve been responsible for making the Arndale Tower flash, wrapping Cathedral Gardens in 7km of hazard tape, and encouraging a mass audience conga and a glitter-cannon Hallelujah chorus! On the less eccentric side, over the years hÅb has also worked with literally hundreds of young NW artists to help them create new pieces of theatre + dance.

Please send programming enquiries to me at info@habmcr.org

I’m joined in this lunacy by John Franklin, greenroom’s long time programme co-ordinator, the friendly face greeting you and eliciting your feedback at many of our events; we’re grateful for the support of Catherine (Cat) Shaw, and our occasional band of hÅbettes.

What our audiences have said about us

• Always special, bringing the unexpected and intriguing, thank you.
• Bringing some of the most interesting performance work in the world to our city.
• Fabulous for seeing things different from the mainstream machine.
• Great organisation — a reason to move to Manchester.
• I don’t know what I would do with my spare time without you.
• Refreshing company that brings diverse shows to our door steps.
• WoW are great, supporting emerging work and bringing it to new audiences.