A sausage-maker and an apprentice walk into a kitchen, but this is no joke...

After working in a basement kitchen for as long as they can remember, Master Sausage is content with their life. They work hard and cannot imagine doing anything else. They can't do anything else. Master Sausage represents old traditions, being stuck in an unhealthy work cycle, and working like a dog only to benefit the upper class. When a fresh-faced apprentice arrives, babbling streams of consciousness, artistic passions and a harsh reality are brought with them. As a young artist recently out of education, the apprentice is a symbol of struggling students in the Arts industry who try to find their feet after graduation. They represent the difficulties of finding a job and how people have to do what they have to do before they can do what they want to do. When the apprentice eventually finds work in the Master’s kitchen, these contrasting characters must find a way to work together to appease the greed of the Top Steps.

Tensions begin to rise and sinister questions start to rear their heads. What does it mean to be happy? Is there more to life than this? What's in those sausages anyway?

Served with a side of dynamic choreography, abstract language, and an original soundtrack, Expial Atrocious presents ‘BUTCHERED’. A new, blood-thirsty absurdist drama about challenging tradition, escaping the mundane and doing what has to be done.

Expial Atrocious is a West Midlands-based theatre company which was co-founded in the back of a Wetherspoons in Worcester. With the aim of finding new and unusual methods of storytelling at the heart of their practice, the company like to explore certain themes such as: the darker side of human nature, the lengths people will go for their deepest desire and the intricacies of human interactions. 'BUTCHERED' is Expial Atrocious' first in-the-flesh production following the success of their immersive digital drama 'Hear. Speak. See.' which premiered at the online Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 2021.

Praise for ‘BUTCHERED’

***** “Expial Atrocious astound with stellar performances, sensational writing and simple yet masterfully executed stagecraft.” (Fringebiscuit)

**** “This is an experience that will leave you shocked, shaken and possibly feeling like you want a shower afterwards. And maybe, just maybe, a sausage as well.” (British Theatre Guide)

**** “It’s all in the sound… These sound effects provide the grisly direct-line to the audience’s upset stomachs.” (EdFringeReview)