Public Enemy: Flint is a project to bring together a coalition of leading UK and US theatre artists to stage Ibsen’s Enemy of the People at the Sylvester Broome Empowerment Village in north Flint in June 2017.

Why?

Even though the water crisis made headlines in 2014, 100,000 people in Flint still can't open their faucets and trust that their water is safe. That means using bottled water for everything: for showering, for washing vegetables, for making juice. And of course, nobody knows what the long-term health effects of what happened here are going to be.

But Flint is a resilient place. And we, as people in the arts, have a responsibility to think not only about our own projects, but also about what is going on in the wider world, and what we can do to respond.

On 8th,9th & 10th June, Flint residents, community leaders, local and national artists and campaigners will join a multi-racial cast from around the States to share perspectives on what has happened in Flint in the last decades and discuss possible ways forward. Performances will be free, and the idea is that the play – written in 1882 – becomes a jumping off point for three days of interactive discussion, with a series of accompanying events, music, talks and so on. It's about water, but it's also about more than that: asking deeper questions about the nature of democracy and creating a platform from which residents can make their voices heard.

Partners include UM-Flint Department of Theatre and Dance, Detroit Public Theatre, Tectonic, Berkeley Repertory Theater, CenterStage Baltimore, the Goodman Theatre, Chautauqua Theater Company, People's Light as well as a whole range of actors, artists, private individuals and campaigners. You can be part of it too with a donation, however small or large.

From Angela, young Flint mom:
"The way I see it is: if your neighbor's house is on fire, you go and help. It doesn't matter that it isn't your house. I think we're all neighbors in the end"