• Runtime: 120 minutes

• Theatre

by Duncan Macmillan with Jonny Donahoe

“Sam suggested that I talk to someone. Professionally. That made me so angry. I knew what depression was and I knew I was fine.”

You’re seven years old. Mum’s in hospital. Dad says she’s “done something stupid”. She finds it hard to be happy. You start a list of everything that’s brilliant about the world, everything worth living for – ice cream, water fights, staying up late to watch TV…

You leave it on her pillow. You know she’s read it because she’s corrected your spelling. As years go by, you grow up, go off to university and fall in love. Perhaps your list of every brilliant thing might even help you.

Duncan Macmillan’s unusual play, which debuted at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 2014, invites the audience to lend their imaginations to the enterprise, as the narrator recounts his childhood experiences of his mother’s depression, and his adult life. This funny, uplifting piece confronts something tough – the realisation that we can’t always make those we love happy.

This amateur production is presented by arrangement with Casarotto Ramsay & Associates Ltd.