A theatrical approach to mental health – Guardian

Posted on May 18, 2011 by admin
Ruby Wax - Losing it - Guardian Review.

Ruby Wax in Losing It at the Menier Chocolate Factory, London, in February. Photograph: Alastair Muir/Rex Features

Since 2004, the Menier Chocolate Factory has been a successful theatre, transferring productions to the West End and Broadway. But, this month, the theatre is being transformed for a different purpose altogether. It will become a part-time mental health drop-in centre.

It is all part of the return of Losing It, a two-woman show about mental health, written and performed by comic actor Ruby Wax and musician Judith Owen, which debuted at the venue earlier in the year following a successful tour around the country in theatres and mental health facilities.

As part of the new run, the Chocolate Factory is holding drop-in sessions, in conjunction with the charity Sane, for people seeking support with mental health issues.

Owen, a singer-songwriter, is looking forward to this new development, which she and Wax have been hoping for since the show’s inception. “We’re very excited – we wanted to be able to get psychiatrists and nurses and whoever it might be, so that people know where to phone, where to go online, where to get help. It’s about talking to people who understand.”

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Ruby Wax, Losing It – Observer Review

Posted on March 19, 2011 by admin

Ruby Wax - Judith Owen - Losing It Review - Observer.It’s now such a commonplace for anyone off the telly to do a stint in the Priory, rehab and psychiatric clinic to the stars, that we rarely stop to think about the story that led them there. Former inmate Ruby Wax first performed this show, a bittersweet history of her own breakdown peppered with insights from her recent studies in neuroscience, to an audience of fellow Priory patients, and has since toured it around mental health facilities before bringing this version, directed by Thea Sharrock, to London’s Chocolate Factory. If that sounds dauntingly like group therapy, don’t be put off. Wax is as splendidly rude, brash, acerbic and….

Read full Losing It review

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Ruby Wax: Losing It – Guardian Review

Posted on March 18, 2011 by admin

Ruby Wax - Judith Owen - Losing It - Guardian Review.Theatre can offer many things: entertainment, enlightenment, ecstasy. But this strange show is something else: theatre as therapy. In the first half Ruby Wax, accompanied by singer-pianist Judith Owen, offers a confessional cabaret about the conditions that led to her mental illness. After the interval the women engage in a dialogue with the audience. Only then did I feel we began to get close to the reality of the subject.

Wax’s aim is clearly to chart her own experience in the hope it can help others. She talks about her American upbringing, her sense of childhood isolation, her belief that fame could offer a vindictive triumph over circumstance. “I ended up on TV,” she tells us, “because I had the drive of a rottweiler.” But, having acquired the trappings of success, Wax found herself prey to an illness that left her in a state of paralysing inertia at a school sports day. A spell in the Priory was followed by a later “tsunami of a depression“, further treatment and her emergence into a state where she can talk freely about her condition.

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Ruby Wax ‘Losing It’ returns to the Menier Chocolate Factory

Posted on March 5, 2011 by admin

Due to unprecedented demand
Ruby Wax-Losing It
returns to the Menier Chocolate Factory
from Tuesday, 17 May to Sunday, 19 June 2011

With the entire run sold out before opening night, comedienne, interviewer and documentary maker Ruby Wax and singer-songwriter Judith Owen will be returning to the Menier Chocolate Factory with RUBY WAX-LOSING IT for a further five weeks from Tuesday 17th May.

In this hilarious and sometimes dark show Ruby Wax, currently undertaking her Master’s at Oxford University,  discusses the toxins of our time – envy, fame, television, the insatiable drive to win, getting rich, getting the perfect body, marriage, kids, career and, above all, staying busy while looking like you’re having a nice day. This is why we all, at one point in our lives, feel like we’re about to go under or, in Ruby’s case, fall off a cliff.

This story is told with Wax’s distinctive wit, sharp observation and worldly wisdom, alongside Judith Owen’s poignant music, which serves as the emotional soundtrack to Wax’s words. Judith has been described by Jamie Cullum as “a female Randy Newman” and by The New York Times as having “the kind of folk-jazz voice that slices away surfaces to touch the vulnerable emotional nerve endings and leave you quivering”

RUBY WAX-LOSING IT is directed by Thea Sharrock and produced by Chocolate Factory Productions in conjunction with MJE Productions.

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‘Losing It’ Drop in Forum for Mental Health

Posted on March 4, 2011 by admin

Wax/Owen Mental Health Forum to be held once a week at the Menier Chocolate Factory on Thursdays between 2pm-4pm.

Each week will feature a guest speaker to come and talk with whatever size group attends and there will be an open forum discussion that will be used to disseminate info about various mental health resources.

Donations will be solicited on behalf of SANE.

The schedule will be as follows: each Thursday starting May 19th, May 26th, June 2nd, June 9th and June 16th.

Speakers include:

  • Dr Mark Collins: 19th May
  • Professor Lewis Wolpert: 26 May
  • Professor Shitij Kapur: 2nd June
  • Professor Mark Williams: 9th June
  • Camila Batmanghelidjh: 16th June
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We both bedded Mr.Burns

Posted on February 18, 2011 by admin

From the Daily Mail – 18th February 2011.
As Ruby Wax and best friend Judith Owen begin their new soul-baring show, they confess to both bedding Mr Burns!

She was the brash, bullying queen of comedy who made a career out of being rude. So who would be brave (or stupid) enough to share a stage with Ruby Wax?

The U.S. star’s new show, Ruby Wax: Losing It, is an account of the comedienne’s battle to admit and overcome bipolar disorder. It was meant to be serious, but Ruby says the script is the funniest she’s ever written.

And she’s right. Losing It is not only an irreverent look at her mental illness, but also an insight into superficial celebrity culture, charting her career, marriage, motherhood and, finally, the terrifying question of what next?

Read full article online here: Ruby Wax and Judith Owen – Losing It – Daily Mail
View full newspaper article click image below:

Daily Mail - 18th Feb 2011 - Ruby Wax.

View Full Online Article: Click Image Above.
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Independent Article | Ruby Wax | 18th Feb 2011

Posted on February 18, 2011 by admin

Cultural Life: Ruby Wax, comedian

Cultural Life - Ruby Wax - 18th February 2011 - The Independent.

Wax says: 'I never buy albums; I don't like the pop charts at all'

Books: I’ve recently finished Jonathan Franzen’s fantastic novel, ‘Freedom’. Every sentence is so dark and to the heart of what is wrong with America. Celebrating dysfunctionality, as an expose of American psyche, it doesn’t just hit the nail on the head – it slams it into the ground and kills it.

Television: Having seen every episode at least three times, ‘House’ is my religion. I’m a true obsessive. Hugh Laurie is the most interesting character, he is just superb. I also love ’30 Rock’. I’ve never seen anyone write like that: not one minute goes by that’s not hilarious. Alec Baldwin is very sexy and this is definitely his best show ever. ‘Episodes’ is also pretty good, I love the head of comedy who never speaks; the way she smiles and sneers makes it look like she is going to be sick all the time.

Read Full Article – Cultural Life: Ruby Wax, comedian

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Ruby Wax discusses her depression in new show ‘Losing It’ (BBC News)

Posted on February 10, 2011 by admin

Ruby and Judith Talk Mental Health on BBC Breakfast News.10 February 2011 Last updated at 11:39

Ruby Wax and Judith Owen talked to BBC Breakfast about their new show ‘Losing It’ which tackles their own experiences from mental health issues.

Losing It is on at the Menier Chocolate Factory, in London from Tuesday.

Watch BBC Breakfast interview here

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Depression is not just a bad hair day (Evening Standard)

Posted on February 9, 2011 by admin

By Sophie Goodchild, Health and Social Affairs Correspondent

Ruby Wax - Losing It.

Laughing matter: Ruby Wax says humour is essential for removing the stigma of mental illness. Her play Losing It opens next week.

You’re the wildebeest on the outside that’s going to get eaten first,” says Ruby Wax. “The moment you’re maimed mentally means you’re lunch. It’s totally primitive.” Wax is sitting in a smart west London restaurant discussing mental illness – and how the rules of the jungle still apply if you “crack up”.

The 57-year-old comedian has always been relatively open about her depression and treatment at the Priory clinic. But, she says, there is still huge stigma for sufferers like her – the one in four who experience “the dark side”.

“It used to be whether you were gay, then it was cancer,” says Wax.

“Once you couldn’t be a witch and now it’s if you have a flaw [of mental illness]. You’re not as resilient as the rest of the human race, definitely.”

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How We Met: Ruby Wax & Judith Owen (The Independent)

Posted on January 30, 2011 by admin

Interviews by Adam Jacques
Sunday, 30 January 2011

Ruby Wax 58

Ruby Wax Losing It - Lifting the lid off of Mental Illness Discrimination.

Wax (left) says: 'I told her I'd something wrong with me too. Sharing a disorder is the ultimate bond'

After studying psychology at university, Wax became known for her brash, unruly brand of humour as an actor, TV presenter and comedian. Her latest work is ‘Losing It’, a stand-up show focusing on her struggles with bipolar disorder. She lives in London with her husband and children

I’d been friends with Judith’s husband, [the actor] Harry [Shearer], since the 1980s, and when he told me he’d married her [in 1993], I wasn’t overly thrilled; I thought I’d have been a better catch. He must have brought her over to my house a number of times, but I blanked her.

Some years later, we were on a flight to New York, having both been at this glitzy party in Venice, and I was sat next to her. I’m terrified of flying, so I grabbed her hand as we were about to land and a conversation came out of that. She told me her mother killed herself and she had something wrong with her as well, so I told her I had something wrong with me; sharing a disorder is the ultimate bond.

After that our friendship was still connected to whenever Harry would come over to UK, as Judith would be there too, but my focus turned to her. She seemed to have so much more depth and her singing became magnificent to me. I’d make her sing “Smoke on the Water” over and over at parties, then she wrote a song for me. I’m famous for coming from a house of madness and the song was about somebody cutting through it all.

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