{"id":334663,"date":"2025-08-11T02:43:20","date_gmt":"2025-08-11T02:43:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/334663\/"},"modified":"2025-08-11T02:43:20","modified_gmt":"2025-08-11T02:43:20","slug":"mans-crazy-moment-as-strangers-approach-him-in-bar-after-work","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/334663\/","title":{"rendered":"Man’s ‘crazy moment’ as strangers approach him in bar after work"},"content":{"rendered":"

Joe Cowin was in the Arts Bar on Hope Street when it happened<\/p>\n

09:00, 10 Aug 2025Updated 16:58, 10 Aug 2025<\/p>\n

\"JoeJoe Cowin, from Kirkby, began his career at 10-years-old<\/p>\n

A young Merseyside actor has told of a \u201cweird and crazy\u201d moment when a group of parents approached him in a city venue. Joe Cowin, from Kirkby<\/a>, had just finished work when people he had never even met came up to him in the Arts Bar.<\/p>\n

Joe, who was a teenager at the time, said it was a \u201cfull-circle\u201d moment as strangers began telling him how much they could relate to his work. The freelancer had just finished a sell-out run of I Am Steven Gerrard<\/a>, a play about love, loss and loneliness, at The Hope Street Theatre.<\/p>\n

Written by Huyton-born playwright Sean McLoughlin<\/a>, it follows Shane, a young man with a dream not just to be like the Liverpool legend, but to become him. But as the one-hour and twenty-minute one-man show progresses, layers are peeled back, and it becomes clear this isn\u2019t just a football fantasy. It\u2019s a search for identity, belonging, and meaning in a world that doesn\u2019t always make space for sensitivity.<\/p>\n

The 20-year-old told the ECHO<\/a>: \u201cIt\u2019s a play people can relate to and not just people from Liverpool. I\u2019ve had mums, dads, nans, everyone say to me how much they understand the story. We had a thought-wall up to allow people to write what they felt about the show, and everyone kept mentioning its reliability.<\/p>\n

\"JoeJoe Cowin in I am Steven Gerard<\/p>\n

\u201cAfter the show, parents came up to me and said how they connected to the story in different ways. We were in the Arts Bar, and it happened, and then it happened again when we were in the Courtyard bar.<\/a> You never know how it’s going to be taken, but to have that reaction and the feedback from the public was crazy.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo have people come up to me and tell me what they had been through in their lives was quite weird, actually, but in a good way.\u201d<\/p>\n

Joe began acting at the Divine Theatre Company when he was 10-years-old. Fast forward to today, and the actor has trained and graduated from Rare Studios. He is now preparing to bring back I Am Steve Gerrard, but this time to the Epstein Theatre.<\/p>\n

The All Saints Catholic High School <\/a>said: \u201cShane, the character, isn\u2019t gay, but I am, and that\u2019s how I feel I connect with him. I didn\u2019t grow up liking football, and never connected with the lads I went to school with because we didn’t like the same things.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was different from everyone in school. While all the lads were football mad, playing it every break time, I just sat in the drama studio. It feels full-circle to be able to tell this story now because of what my experience was like. It\u2019s very rewarding. Sitting in the drama studio, I would\u2019ve never guessed I would be in this position now. To be able to tell the story every night is amazing.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"TheThe iconic Epstein Theatre will officially reopen in September 2025(Image: Andrew Teebay)<\/p>\n

The Tip Tray Theatre\u2014a Merseyside-based, disabled-led arts organisation\u2014will perform at the Hanover Street venue from Thursday, September 11, to Saturday, September 13. Tickets are on sale now.<\/p>\n

I Am Steven Gerrard was born out of Liverpool\u2019s vibrant grassroots theatre scene. Originally developed through Tip Tray Theatre\u2019s What Happens Next? writing competition, Sean McLoughlin\u2019s debut play has quickly grown.<\/p>\n

The playwright, a graduate of the Everyman\u2019s YEP Writers scheme, has used his personal experience to challenge traditional notions of what it means to be a man, and to feel lost in the place you are supposed to call home.<\/p>\n

Sean McLoughlin said: \u201cThis show was borne out of years of feeling on the outside. It\u2019s for anyone who has felt like they didn\u2019t fit in \u2013 especially in a city where football is a second religion. I\u2019m so excited to be given the opportunity to have the show on at such a respected theatre as the Epstein.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"II am Steven Gerard is returning to the city to be performed once again by Joe Cowin<\/p>\n

I Am Steven Gerrard is part of the Epstein Theatre\u2019s first season after reopening four months ago<\/a>. A full autumn schedule is set to be officially launched with a special Gala Night on Friday, 19 September – Brian Epstein\u2019s birthday \u2013featuring local acts and celebrities.<\/p>\n

Epstein Theatre general manager Anthony Proctor said: \u201cWhen I saw I Am Steven Gerrard last year I was absolutely bowled over by the quality of the production. It\u2019s a powerful and captivating look at a subject that\u2019s hugely important, but which still isn\u2019t talked about enough \u2013 the idea of masculinity, identity, the pressure to fit in and what happens when you don\u2019t.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo, when we were looking at programming the Epstein\u2019s opening season, we just knew that this had to be a part of it, and I\u2019m absolutely delighted to welcome the brilliant Tip Tray Theatre as it makes its Hanover Street debut, along with the very talented Joe Cowin who made his stage debut here 10 years ago.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Joe Cowin was in the Arts Bar on Hope Street when it happened 09:00, 10 Aug 2025Updated 16:58,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":334664,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8815],"tags":[748,393,42484,4884,14721,179,2349,10246,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-334663","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-liverpool","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-england","10":"tag-epstein-theatre","11":"tag-great-britain","12":"tag-lgbtqia","13":"tag-liverpool","14":"tag-liverpool-city-centre","15":"tag-steven-gerrard","16":"tag-uk","17":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115007835990142393","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/334663","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=334663"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/334663\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/334664"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=334663"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=334663"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=334663"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}