Work, But This Time Like You Mean It

Neon lighting has dried out your eyeballs. The grease has permeated your sneakers. You think you can hear salt. A group of fast food workers are just trying to get through another shift. They’re underpaid and overworked and the customers keep coming and time is moving backwards and they need to stop working.

Work, But This Time Like You Mean It is a darkly surreal comedy about young people’s first experiences in the workplace. It’s about having a good work ethic on less-than-minimum wage. It’s about perseverance when you just want to curl up under the counter and cry. It’s an unhinged, deep-fryer-dive into deeply human relationships, forged within the most alienating of circumstances.

It’s fricken tasty!

Canberra Youth Theatre brings Honor Webster-Mannison's anarchic comedy to The Rebel Theatre in Walsh Bay for five performances only, 15–18 October.

"a madcap, skit-like experience full of joyful comedy... as good as a cheeky bit of fried chicken you weren’t planning on eating, but somehow seemed to hit the spot." – City News

“A sharp-shooting shot at the employment of young people in the fast food industry. Fast is the word. In fact frenetic may be more like it… a very clever, witty, surreal satire.” – Canberra Critics Circle

This tour is supported by the Australian Theatre for Young People, and the ACT Government. Work, But This Time Like You Mean It was the winner of Canberra Youth Theatre’s Emerging Playwright Commission in 2022, supported by Holding Redlich.