Belly Flop

“My daughter needs to see this!”- audience member, Fringe Theatrefest 2025

A comedy-dance-theatre show with a mumifesto. Belly Flop is heart-warming, hilarious, and an honest account of diving head first into motherhood and going through matrescence – the process of becoming a mother that is as transformative as adolescence.

“Funny, powerful, emotive.” – audience member, Fringe Theatrefest 2025

A trained dancer and now a working mum, Sam explores juggling expectations and societal pressures, drawing parallels between society’s value of the arts and parenting. Armed with facts and stats, Belly Flop is a rally cry to value and give applause to the invisible, unpaid workforce raising the next generation. Sam wants this show to empower women to share their experiences, and inform helpful allies by arming them with insight and understanding, to change attitudes and support mothers better. Sam uses dance, poetry, and storytelling in this relatable, myth-busting, and moving show.

Belly Flop draws from autobiographical accounts of childbirth, postpartum recovery, poonamis, feeling touched out, loss of identity, changes in grey matter in the brain, and discovering that becoming a mother e.g. matrescence, is as transformative as adolescence, who knew!? Expect to laugh, cry, and probably wet yourself (at least one of us will). Bring pads, snacks, and your baby. 

“Innovative, sincere, flow of personal and communal autobiography.” – Audience member, From Devon With Love 2025

“Loved it! Loved the mix of comedy, drama, spoken word and dance, relatable & thought provoking. Feel like I understand my friends & family who are mums better.”- Audience member, Fringe Theatrefest 2025

“Brilliant! Loved the combination of all the elements (text, movement, music) & direct connection with the audience. Swift, funny, relatable and heartfelt!”

Why have I made this show?

A show made by a mother, for mothers, at every stage and every age. I was shocked becoming a mum, and I really couldn’t “enjoy every minute”, when I was so used to whizzing around, being independent and generally out of the house most of the day, talking, working and being creative with other people. Suddenly alone, monotonously mashing sweet potato, always in my new home having moved from the city of Southampton to a rural seaside town in South Devon, I felt cut-off and desperate for adult interaction and creative stimulation. I was totally in love with my new child but struggling with the postpartum anxiety and I struggled to get out of the house, and was often an hour late to most things – which is generally the length of baby centred activities.

So, I wanted to make a highly relatable show using real life experiences that will get audiences members, and hopefully other mums and especially newborn mums and dads in the throws of early parenting, to be entertained, and feel seen and heard. So far I’ve got a 40 minute work-in-progress, and I’ve had amazing responses, with audiences nodding their heads saying “mmhmm” throughout. Belly Flop compares my expectations of childbirth, postpartum recovery and parenting, to the reality of becoming a mother & co-parent, and talks about all the things we didn’t know we were allowed to talk about… I prize the vault wide open, using humour to laugh together at the absurdity of the patriarchy, the joy, the mundanity, the domesticity, the unconditional love, the sacrifice, and especially, to applaud the 24/7 work of parenting – while learning on the job and recovering from a major surgery/life-changing event, that is often traumatic and needs talking about, to heal. As I was told when getting into a career in the arts: “you’re not getting into this for the money, but for the love of it!” But, with both, in an ideal world that looks something like Ireland and Norway, it would be so lovely to be given a universal income, to and continue to make accessible art for all for education and wellbeing.

THANK YOU!

Thank you to Arts Council England for DYCP funding in 2024 and to Exeter Phoenix, Mast Mayflower Studios, Theatre Alibi and Northcott Barnfield Theatre, for giving me space to labour and birth Belly Flop. For the Maternal Journal workshop I attended at 16 weeks postpartum, first discovering the word: MATRESCENCE, and being allowed to be my angry, blubbering self, in the most supportive, accepting and creative space when I was so creatively under-stimulated, thank you Lizzy Humber, and Claire Tonti. Thank you Lizzy also for the Daylight Collective events: M/others on the Mic, providing space to try out reading my poetry, and for running the Comedy course led by the uproarious Angie Belcher, along with the other hilarious Funny Mummies. For helping me birth the ideas out into the world, with HUMOUR and some structure, thank you to Sophie Ross, Helen Bovey, Perdita Stott. For working with me in the studio, and helping me translate very open and honest conversations about these very strong, meaningful and relatable experiences into movement: Grace Sellwood, Alexa Mason, Winona Guy. For conversations, inspiration, great quotes and motivation, thank you to my Village crew and Breastfeeding Peer Support group (BAPS): Charlie, Ella, Esme, Helen, Nikki, Jenny, Rosie, Sondoss, Tamasha, Verity. For giving me so much imagery and well researched facts, thanks to Lucy Jones for writing the book Matrescence. And lastly, thank you to cheerleaders: my hubby Olie, my mum Kate Guest and my ultimate inspiration, co-deviser and the best thing I’ve ever made, my daughter Adelaide.