THE SIEGE

The Siege tells the story of the privatisation of social housing in Rochdale, Greater Manchester. McBride uses verbatim and documentary theatre to interrogate systems of power, democracy and, specifically, how this affects housing, a major battleground in the modern-day fight against inequality.

The Siege has been in development since August 2025, when McBride moved to Rochdale, to follow the activities of the housing campaign ‘Save Seven Sisters and College Bank’. These local residents are fighting to save a local council estate (pictured above) from demolition. Over the last ten months, he has conducted interviews and investigations.

Like all McBride’s work, the play will tell this specific campaign story - which is live and still unfolding - as well as exploring how systems of power operate.

Currently in development, we were able to run a 3 day R&D on the first part of the play, with students from the University of Manchester and Performers College. This gave us the opportunity to share the first 40 minutes with campaigners and residents for feedback.

We are now in the process of securing funding to allow us to produce the full play.