ABOUT US

Debuting in the 2021 Auckland Fringe Festival, at the Covert Theatre - REHAB has now performed seven acclaimed seasons, including Basement Theatre, November 2023 & Pumphouse Theatre, October 2025

The REHAB cast includes an eclectic mix of actors, improvisers and stand-up comedians. Learn more on our HOME page.

Threaded with lived experience, bold honesty, vulnerability and humour, we hope REHAB makes the concept of recovery more open and accessible as a cultural reference point.

REHAB boldly and unapologetically illustrates that addiction (substance abuse disorder) is not a character flaw - rather a health condition, in which recovery is possible - for anyone who wants it.   

REHAB’s impact has proven to be broad, engaging authentic connections with its consistently diverse audience members. And a sense of pride & joy from recovery members and current rehab residents who have loved seeing such an accurate, humorous & relatable depiction of their world on stage.

REHAB is created & produced by Elizabeth Cracroft. Based on & inspired by her own & others’ lived experience in addiction, rehab & recovery. Elizabeth has been clean & sober since July 2009, attended residential rehab & many recovery meetings since then, to maintain her sobriety. She has a background in acting, improv, and theatre and is also a criminal defence lawyer. 

In February 2020, Elizabeth was brushing her teeth and had an idea. 

A busy single mum about to enter her third year of law school, she had joined the Covert Theatre a few years earlier to embrace the art of improv theatre. With a background in acting, improv felt like a second home. 

While reflecting on 20 things at the same time, she felt frustrated about a recent series of events where either she or her recovery friends experienced varying levels of unease & judgement after revealing why they really don’t drink, etc, revealing their recovery. 

Ten years sober at the time, Elizabeth wished some folk could look past any judgement and instead see the real, three-dimensional human being, rather than be reduced to their past challenges with substance abuse.

ENTER REHAB…

REHAB was created to demonstrate that addiction doesn’t discriminate, humanise the person dealing with the issue, and normalise the concept of entering recovery. To make the subject matter more palatable, it had to be a dark comedy - authentically the type of dark humour Elizabeth, and many others, had experienced in rehab and recovery.

With the support of the Covert Theatre, REHAB debuted in the Februrary 2021, Auckland Fringe Festival. 

After three further Covert seasons, Elizabeth continued to evolve REHAB into a larger, diverse ensemble cast of actors, most recently showing at Basement Theatre (2023), ArtWorks Waiheke (2024) and The Pumphouse Theatre (2025)

Most crucially, REHAB is built on a staunch foundation of raw, authentic & extensive lived experience.

Throughout the creation process, Elizabeth has spent years building and evolving the show by weaving elements of her own experience and drawing (consented) inspiration from her tight-knit recovery community; regularly calling on additional input from recovery friends & drug & alcohol clinicians.

Since early 2021, after the encouragement of many audience members,  Elizabeth and others have been working earnestly to make REHAB into a TV Series - read more about that through the link below.