Northern Stage has already secured funding to co-produce the show, first in Middlesbrough, where the novel is set and then on an eight week national tour. The Traverse theatre has recently invited Northern Stage to be part of their programme in this year’s festival. The Traverse is one of the most highly regarded venues in the UK, with an excellent reputation for high quality performance work. £20,000 would cover venue hire, performers wages, re-staging and technical costs for a three week run in Edinburgh. Presenting Apples in Edinburgh would take both the show and Northern Stage to a new level. International promoters from across the world come to the Edinburgh Festival each year to find the latest talent and exciting shows and this could result in a new life for the show. The characters in Apples feed every stereotype currently applied to young disaffected people; they are violent, shameless, ruthless, and their horizons reach only to their next night out. And yet they challenge our prejudices, because Milward reveals their brave, complex and profound inner lives, battling for self-esteem. We would like to reach a teenage audience who hardly ever see influences or representation of their lives on stage and therefore don’t think theatre is for them. We would like to engage with young people in a meaningful way and believe Apples will strike a chord with them, whilst offering supporters an association with a stimulating and pioneering piece of new work that will also appeal to educators and policy makers. “Apples is an electrifying book, as frightening as it is funny.” The Times, April 2007 “Heartbreaking, honest and accurate, Apples reads like the book of Genesis recreated on the set of Shameless.” The London Paper, April 2007