j.f.orford@bham.ac.uk

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Success at Brighton Fringe Festival

by | Jun 6, 2026 |

I am delighted to report that my collaboration with poet, writer, and writing for health & wellbeing facilitator Christine Hollywood has chalked up a success. Our 2026 Brighton Fringe Festival literature and spoken word event, entitled Addiction – It’s a Family Matter. Who Cares was sold out, receiving plaudits ranging from ‘thought provoking and moving’ and ‘it has opened an important conversation’ to ‘a polished performance,’ ‘beautifully choreographed,’ and ‘so useful for the service I work for.’ Our special thanks to actress Kate Dyson and poets Seamus Fox and Charles Anthony who made guest appearances.

We drew on a rich source of insights about addiction and the family in the form of autobiographical writing by affected family members – mothers, fathers, wives, sisters, brothers, some famous names from the worlds of sport and music among them. Our aim was to raise awareness about this important but relatively neglected aspect of addiction.

We are now up and running as Hollyford Productions and looking for further opportunities to make presentations to either professional bodies with a special interest in the subject or to general audiences. Our preferred style is a presentation of readings from our sources, and Q&A and general discussion. One forthcoming engagement will be at the annual conference in September of the Addiction and the Family International Network (AFINet).

We are also interested to learn of other sources of published autobiographies, memoirs, or works of autobiographical fiction written by addiction-affected family members. All our sources at Brighton Fringe were British ones, so we would especially welcome knowing of works from other countries and cultures.

@christine hollywood @richard Velleman

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