Writer & actress Annie Davison performs her one-woman show “Bairns” in Soho this week, providing a “touching and amusing portrait of surrogacy“.
The “rising star” is set to perform the show for the last two times prior to the play’s TV adaptation, currently in development with a prominent UK production company.
Davison said regarding the show’s origin: “My sister was wanting to start a family, and I said to my mum, ‘If there was ever any situation where my sister couldn’t conceive naturally, I would do it.
“She turned to me, and she said, ‘I could never give away my baby, not even for my baby.’
“That’s now a line in the show – I made this big crazy promise that I would do that, and it got me thinking that I don’t understand what it takes to be a mother.”
Bairns was initially conceived in 2024 for SE Fest, a London based writing festival, before Davison completed a month-long run of the show at the Edinburgh Fringe last summer.
A review from The Stage called the show, “frenetically funny”, while London Theatre Direct called the show “an immaculate piece of theatre”.
Balanced with Davison’s comedic stylings, the show focuses on some of the intricacies of surrogacy legislation that most people might not be aware of.
Davison said: “I came across this fascinating law in the UK where the surrogate is considered the legal mother of the child, even if the egg and sperm used are donated.
“Even if she’s not genetically related to the child in any way, the person who gives birth is legally considered the mother.”
She went on to describe the basis of UK surrogacy laws, that being altruistic gestational surrogacy, and how a lot of perceptions of surrogacy are, instead, from the US legal system.
The UK’s altruistic surrogacy laws are structured with the goal of preventing human trafficking, meaning that while you can be given expenses during your pregnancy, you cannot be seen to be making a profit from being a surrogate. The stringent nature of these laws does make situations like the one faced by Davison’s character, Lottie, a lot more complex.
In this way, Bairns is both funny and an excellent educational tool, exploring the emotional and legal sides of a process most people are unaware of. Davison said that as she has never been a surrogate, she “worked hard to try and give an authentic voice to that”.
She said, “I have to say, I don’t think I’m a selfless enough person to do it.
“Having had conversations and put on the costume of someone who would be so amazing as to be a surrogate, I don’t think I could do it.”
“But for me, one thing that has stayed with me for the whole journey of the show is that ultimately this is a story about sisters, and about the love between sisters, rather than whether or not you want a baby.
“My experience of having a sister has been one of the greatest relationships of my entire life, and I’m very lucky to have my sister specifically. So hands off everybody else!”
Alongside Bairns’ TV adaptation, Davison is currently developing other original ideas for TV with several production companies.
Bairns is on Tuesday and Wednesday this week at Underbelly Boulevard Soho, and you can buy tickets here.
Featured image credit: Will Dolan
