by Diana Miranda

Written and co-performed by Bulgarian migrant Theo Hristov, Working Class Hero is an absurdist satire that takes us on a high-speed romp through the British class system via two actors with different backgrounds: a white, privately-educated Posh Actor frustrated by being pigeonholed, and his friend, a migrant Working Class Actor, who writes a script based on lived experience as a vehicle for himself. When Posh Actor lands the role instead, the shift cracks open the tensions beneath their friendship and the British casting ecosystem. Working Class Hero has taken the floor at Baron’s Court Theatre this month as part of VOILÁ Festival 2025. As a multilingual festival that showcases migrant-led productions, VOILÁ Fest seems like an ideal home for Working Class Hero and the questions it raises about the British theatre industry.

I joined an afternoon rehearsal at Theatre Deli ahead of their opening night. The rehearsal studio is much bigger than the basement venue at Baron’s Court, so we corner up at one end of the room, the “stage” outlined with chairs. It’s easy to feel like a nosy snooper when there’s an entire empty studio and you sit one metre away from the actors. But director Blanka Szentandrássy’s welcoming is warm, and both performers seem used to having people in the room, so I soon feel at ease.

I introduce myself as a theatre writer dissatisfied with mainstream criticism – the kind that engages with a show for two hours (one if it’s fringe), who then writes a review claiming an objective gaze I don’t believe in, and moves on to the next show. I believe opening night is just a blip in the life of a production, so I enjoy offering longer engagement to explore the inner rooms in a show, not just its front porch. “Welcome to our home,” Blanka tells me.

We all check in by naming a dish that represents our current mood (as you do), and the room spans from a bougie sandwich to vegan-friendly soup. There are five of us: director Blanka, performers Theo Hristov and Oscar Nicholson, lighting designer Cian Feasey, and me as an embedded critic. It’s been almost two years since I last saw Theo’s work, also in a rehearsal room and deep in process.

Bringing together a team whose lived experience could help shape the show’s themes has been key. I catch a glimpse from the script, and under “Notes on casting” it reads: “POSH ACTOR should be played by someone who’s posh.” I chuckle. When I teasingly ask Oscar if that means that he’s posh, he shares how that note alone sparked important reflections among the team from the start: “What is posh? Is it your accent? Your background? A social class?” To which I’d add: “What is class? And is migrant a class?”

A few days after the rehearsal, my thoughts shift from Posh Actor to my experience as a migrant in the UK theatre ecosystem. Perhaps my migrant identity is why I’ve never fully warmed to mainstream criticism – criticism that leans on notions of objectivity and normality, reduces who gets to belong, and passes judgment in a way that rarely feels horizontal. Criticism that presents writing which, in their own way, lack representation as acting does. So I like to think that being involved in the show’s process as an unconventional critic feels quietly aligned with its challenge to the British mainstream arts industry.

That afternoon’s rehearsal is unplugged. No tech cues, no props, no set. Cian sets up a camera to film a run-through that, alas, stops recording without us noticing. But Cian knows the format and script now, he assures us, and he has to whoosh off after the run. Time is limited here, as it often is in fringe theatre.

After checking whether the actors feel ready for notes, Blanka goes through her feedback and ideas to polish the work. With that insight laid down, Blanka “loves us and leaves us.” Not by choice, but because, again, that’s fringe: several gigs and only 24 hours in a day.

Theo and Oscar work on transitions with a fast-motion run that feels like watching a fever dream. Then they sit to run lines, lowering their voices as they go. There’s something enthralling about that hushed exchange – as if they’re crafting a private space in which they are complicit, drifting into each other’s words.

Earlier that afternoon, I see Theo hunched over his script, taking notes from Blanka. He’s looking at the lines he wrote as if they were a map, “trying to find the energy behind the words”. This fascinates me. He’s working with the words he himself wrote, yet he approaches them with genuine intrigue. It feels like an occurrence of déjà vu. Later on, I find the reason in my old notebooks.

Two years ago, in that other rehearsal – Bad Sex, a piece Theo also wrote and performed – I noted how the director encouraged him to find the dramatic drive behind the words. Words he wrote, but was still discovering through a different light. I think about how an outsider’s eyes, the director this time, can suggest unseen avenues for a creative. I also think of how body and mind are separate tools. If mind crafts the words, body shapes breath, movement, and its own energy arcs. That’s a whole different expedition.

I catch the show days later at the Barons Court, watching how it plays out in front of audiences. The show ricochets between the grounded and the absurd with playfulness, shifting gears in ways that can feel deliberately disorienting, even if not always seamless. But its humour and exaggeration are an undeniable special sauce – it highlights how caricature-like a character can become when it’s watered down as a palatable stereotype, until it becomes nothing but a (literal) box.

However, it’s in the quieter moments where the heart of the show truly beats. A show like this may remind us how working-class and migrant actors have to push hard to open a door that others find ajar, if not wide open. The script is not only a critique of who gets the opportunities, but a call to embrace nuance and complexity in our cultural identities.

Working Class Hero runs through 22 November in VOILÁ Festival at Baron’s Court Theatre, and 5-6 December in Futures Festival at the Pleasance.