When it comes to young absent fathers we all make assumptions. We always presume for instance that they were the ones doing the leaving not the ones left behind and that their remoteness is a mark of disinterest, the coward’s way out. By and large the ‘dad’ never comes out on top. But now a new play showing at the Camden People’s Theatre is seeking to question and counter these stereotypes.

Inspired by candid conversations with dads in London and Cornwall, Pulling Out by Lucy Bell is an hour-long coming of age comedy drama.

The play tells the story of seventeen-year-old Leo who along with a “college and a healthy right-swipe-rate on Tinder” also has a six-month-old through an accidental pregnancy. As Leo struggles through triple shifts of “school, work and night feeds”—attempting to be a dad “in every sense”—he’s questioned and corralled by all and sundry. He’s set up to fail.