Adults Playtext

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by Kieran Hurley

Everyone always grows up thinking it’s the end of the world. The only difference with you lot is you think it makes you special.

A black comedy that is by turns explosive and tender, Adults follows acclaimed playwright Kieran Hurley’s TravFest19 smash-hit Mouthpiece.

Amongst a raft of anonymous Airbnbs in Edinburgh, thirty-something Zara is running her own business and trying to make her way in the world. A new client has just arrived, but her colleague is running late. Tensions are high.

Also, the business is a brothel, the client is her old teacher, and her colleague is having an existential panic attack about growing up. They’re all convinced that they’re the most hard done by, and that the mess of a world that’s around them definitely isn’t their fault. But maybe something has to break between them, before anything can really change.

Adults is a raw, darkly funny play about alienation, loneliness, growing up, growing old - and the human need for connection, intimacy and acceptance to survive in a world that fails you. This edition was published to coincide with the world premiere at the Traverse Theatre during the Festival, in August 2023.