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Making a Killing
Castle Street
The Barbican
Plymouth
Devon
PL12NJ
Opening Times
| Season (8 May 2026) | ||
|---|---|---|
| Day | Times | |
| Friday | 19:00 | - 21:30 |
Prices
£20
About us
The ropes are ready, the crowd is waiting, and the hangman has a new apprentice.
Making a Killing by Ben Kernow
The ropes are ready, the crowd is waiting, and the hangman has a new apprentice. When Claus Kohler is apprenticed to Frantz Schmidt, Nuremberg's seasoned executioner, the two men are thrown together in a world where duty, morality, and power collide, and every decision leaves a mark. But as the gallows fill and suspicion takes root, their fates become dangerously entwined, until both must decide who they are, and which side of the rope they stand on.
Performed by just two actors, Making a Killing is a razor-sharp, dark comedy about justice, corruption, and the cost of survival in a world disturbingly like our own. Bold, biting, and impossible to ignore, the play takes inspiration from The Journal of Master Frantz Schmidt, Public Executioner of Nuremberg, 1573–1617. A remarkable historical record that lays bare the humanity and contradictions of a man who killed for a living.
