The Arbor

1/16/2026

Using a combination on documentary style film making and some more theatrical re-enactments, this takes a candid approach to it’s telling of the story of troubled playwright Andrea Dunbar - probably most famous for her “Rita, Sue and Bob Too”. The arbor in question is a street on the 1950s Buttershaw housing estate in the Yorkshire city of Bradford, and it’s primarily through the eyes of those portraying her children that we get a glimpse of the booze and drug-fuelled lives of many who lived in this working class community. Lorraine (Manjinder Virk) and Lisa (Christine Bottomley) quite ably provide a running narrative combining some more overtly recreated episodes with some cleverly presented lip-synched deliveries from actual conversations that occurred with their mother, between themselv