The Two Worlds of Charlie F

The Two Worlds of Charlie F is a soldier’s view of service, injury and recovery. Moving from the war in Afghanistan, through the dream world of morphine-induced hallucinations to the physio rooms of Headley Court, the play explores the consequences of injury, both physical and psychological, and its effects on others as the soldiers fight to win the new battle for survival at home. The play is a very personal and very moving look at the effects of war on individual combatants, but it also has a huge amount of humour and humanity.

The cast will include ex-servicemen and women Bombardier (Rtd) Gareth Crabbe, Rifleman (Rtd) Daniel Shaw, Darren “Swifty” Swift, Marine Cassidy Little and Lieutenant Col (Rtd) Stewart Hill, with further casting to be announced. Marine Cassidy Little, who plays the title role of Marine Charlie Fowler, was born in Canada and studied performance art in the United States. He then did stand-up comedy in Britain before joining the Marines (as the result of a bet). Cassidy lost a leg in his second tour of Afghanistan.

Writer Owen Sheers is the author of two collections of poetry, The Blue Book and Skirrid Hill, a work of narrative non-fiction about Zimbabwe, The Dust Diaries, a novel, Resistance, and a novella, White Ravens. In 2011, he wrote the script for the National Theatre of Wales’s The Passion, directed by and starring Michael Sheen. His verse drama Pink Mist, commissioned by BBC Radio 4, was published by Faber and won the Hay Medal for Poetry 2013.