Panti Bliss: High Heels And Low Places returns to The Abbey Theatre

The show will have one last hurrah this Spring, embarking on a tour of Ireland and the UK. The final performance brings Panti back to the Abbey stage on April 30, 2017.

In 2014, Panti landed herself in the middle of a media shit-storm dubbed ‘Pantigate’ when the speech she made on the Abbey stage about homophobia, described as ‘the most eloquent Irish speech’ in 200 years by Irish Times columnist Fintan O’Toole, went viral. Broadcast around the world - even remixed by the Pet Shop Boys – the 10-minute speech caused a parliamentary meltdown, was the basis of the award-winning Queen of Ireland documentary, and fed into Ireland’s momentous marriage equality referendum success.

High Heels in Low Places is a global sensation charting the journey from performance legend to accidental activist to National F*cking Treasure, premiered in June 2014 and has gone on to tour the world (twice over!) to critical acclaim. With three years and more than 250 performances on the clock, this final leg kicks off in Glasgow on March 10, travelling via Cardiff, London, Ballymaloe and more, and wrapping up on the Abbey stage in Dublin on April 30.

Hilarious and poignant, High Heels in Low Places traces Panti’s journey from small-town boy kicking against traditions to towering plastique woman making history. Exposing the stories behind the make-up, Panti invites you one more time in to her gender-discombobulating, stiletto-shaped, lash-flapping world, to reveal the National F*cking Treasure she is today.

Panti said: “The show has shocked in Adelaide and Norwich and thrilled in Sarajevo and New York. I have loved meeting audiences (and fellas) all around the world, but I am putting this show to bed with one last fabulous burst across the UK and Ireland with a final party at Dublin’s Abbey Theatre. Even I’m excited!”

A former Tokyo club scene doyenne, Panti is Ireland’s foremost gender illusionist. Having run some of Dublin’s most seminal club nights, and hosted the legendary Alternative Miss Ireland pageant, the landlady of Pantibar in Dublin made her theatrical debut in 2007 with the critically acclaimed, sold-out In These Shoes?. This is Panti’s sixth theatrical collaboration with THISISPOPBABY who continue to “redefine theatre for people left cold by traditional drama” (The Irish Times).

High Heels in Low Places received critical acclaim at the 2016 Edinburgh Festival Fringe as part of Soho Theatre’s 17-show season and has performed to rave reviews and chock-a-block houses across Ireland, England, Australia, Paris, New York, Sarejevo, Oslo and more. Panti has recently been welcomed on stage by U2 to their song ‘Mysterious Ways’ and led the Queer Irish float in the Sydney Mardi Gras Parade which won Best Float Design. After following Panti around for five years, Conor Horgan’s documentary The Queen of Ireland opened in Ireland as the most successful Irish documentary in the country ever. High Heels in Low Places is now set to take off one final time this Spring.

Touring Information

UK Tour Dates:
• 10 March 2017, Glasgow Tramway, Take Me Somewhere Festival
• 1 April 2017, Cardiff, Sherman Cymru
• 5– 8 April 2017, London, Soho Theatre
• 25 April 2017, Home, Manchester

Irish Tour Dates:
• 12 March 2017, Draiocht, Blanchardstown
• 25 March 2017, Ballymaloe House, Cork
• 20 April, The Source Arts Centre, Thurles
• 30 April 2017, The Abbey Theatre, Dublin

Tour tickets and information: thisispopbaby.com