Social atrophy and what it means for theatre club

Early in November 2026 I travelled to Leeds to host a theatre club with Northern Opera Group for Their Eyes Looking for God, an opera that is really a hip-hop and dance show featuring an operatic voice. Although the theatre club was quite small, it captured exactly what I love about these conversations, created exactly what I always hope might be possible. In the circle were a 95-year-old white English woman and, opposite her, a black American woman, a dance student no older than 25, discussing a gorgeous story about two young black men from Toxteth that becomes devastating in the face of police violence. Where else might two people of such different backgrounds and diverse experiences share and hear what each other think about this work?

Of course, your response might be: why does it matter whether or not they do? Especially if they’ll never see each other again? But conversations across difference feel profoundly important to me. They require curiosity, listening, receptivity: skills that are useful in all social interactions. Such conversations are the reason I’ve kept theatre club going for almost fifteen years.

I say kept it going: the truth is, I’ve put less and less effort into organising these discussions. Lots of effort into choosing what performances to see, writing a brief description of them, sharing reminders with the very small mailing list; but zero effort contacting theatres, asking them to publicise theatre club, or doing my own wider publicity. If I were really making an effort, I’d take flyers with me to every play I see, get chatting to people in the queue, let them know how to get involved. But I don’t.

So I shouldn’t be surprised that attendance at theatre club has dwindled. In 2025 it was still possible that five or six people might regularly be sitting together; in 2026, it’s rarely been more than one or two people joining me.

My life was changed by Improbable Theatre Company when they introduced theatre-makers to the principles of Open Space Technology, a weirdly technical name for the discussion format that they use at gatherings and conferences. A key principle is: whoever comes are the right people. I’ve held tight to this through all the years of doing theatre club, insisted that it doesn’t matter if a conversation has just two person in it or twenty. Whoever comes are the right people. And yet, the drop in attendance this year has caused me disquiet.

Have you come across the phrase social atrophy? It’s used to describe not just a rise in loneliness but the ways in which people, to quote political writer Sarah Stein Lubrano, have become “less sociable and indeed less capable of being sociable in the years since the pandemic”. The impact of social atrophy on mental health is devastating. “When we don’t socialise very much we quickly get worse at it, and it becomes much more stressful,” Lubrano argues. “The neuroscience is there: those who are socially isolated for a while lose some of the energy and capability involved in social life. … Some scientists think the shrinkage in the brain associated with social atrophy can last for years, even as we socialise once again.”

This isn’t just an individual problem, says Lubrano: it’s a political problem. Social atrophy affects “the social fabric between us, which has been shown to be good for our health and good for our ability to tolerate those different to us and help one another in a crisis”. In summary, “loneliness and isolation makes us die sooner (much sooner!). It also makes communities weaker, more vulnerable in crises and less capable of tolerating diversity.” (The links, by the way, are Lubrano’s.)

Theatre club has always been my little patch of the social fabric. Although it wasn’t my original idea (I have Lily Einhorn to thank for inviting me to host my first), I found it captivating because it enabled conversations about identity, politics, prejudice, social issues – all the things that easily cause arguments, or are avoided altogether – often between total strangers. It came into being in the years when austerity was aggressively widening the economic divide in society. It continued through the divisive politics of the EU referendum, which exposed simmering resentments stoked by anti-immigration rhetoric. It held people in conversation who had profoundly different experiences, creating space for them to hear each other even through disagreement. I still feel passionate about making that happen. But the space feels pretty hollow when so few people enter it.

In taking the decision to end theatre club – and this is an announcement, that theatre club will be ending this year – I worry that I’m succumbing to the disillusionment, negativity, anxiety that are all symptoms of social atrophy. After all, I still hear from people constantly that a book group for theatre is a brilliant idea. And some of the theatre clubs I’ve had this year with one other person have been fantastic. I think particularly of the conversation after ThisEgg’s Un/fortunately, where the two of us talked about the relationship between money and notions of a good life. How lucky I am, to share ideas with people who aren’t in my immediate circles or near friendship groups. Why would I give that up?

I also worry that I’m acting contrary to my own politics. If, as Lubrano says, “estrangement, alienation and isolation are part of a trend that has been happening over decades, as we stopped having big strong communities, places to go to belong, and a collective habit of being social with those living near us,” why would I take one of those places away?

The answer lies partly in a desire to transfer the energy of theatre club to other community-building activities. I’m part of a local mutual aid group, constantly thinking about how to create new social bonds with people in my vicinity. Rather than stocking up on tinned food and bottled water, as advised by Andy Burnham, to prepare for upcoming emergencies, I want to build friendships that challenge isolation, that understand that emergency is best tackled together. In other words, ending theatre club is a statement of purpose: there is work to do elsewhere, and I want more time for it.

Theatre club has enabled some strong relationships to form as well, and my hope is that those will survive, even if this space to meet doesn’t. I hope people will continue to contact me about shows they’ve seen. I particularly hope that theatre companies and other organisations will continue to contact me about hosting discussions for them. I discovered when invited to join a team away day with Sadler’s Wells that theatre club makes a fantastic bonding activity. Hint hint.

Better still, I hope and fervently wish that one day, there will be theatre clubs happening across the country, standard in every theatre programme, as artistic directors and producers realise the incredible value of supporting people to meet and discuss plays and performances. This idea isn’t rocket science, and it doesn’t need me to make it happen. It’s nothing more complicated than a book group for theatre: a space for people to talk.