Fresh from his hugely successful run of The Man on the Moor at last year’s Edinburgh Festival Fringe, Max Dickins brings this one-man play, inspired by an incredible true story, to Ledbury's Market Theatre.

On December 12, 2015, the body of an elderly-looking man was discovered beside a path on Saddleworth Moor in the Peak District. He was lying on his back, arms placed across his chest like a mummy, facing perfectly straight downhill. He was carrying no form of identification: no phone, no wallet, no cards, no driving licence, and no keys. In his pockets was £130 in cash and three train tickets: Ealing Broadway to London Euston, and a return ticket from Euston to Manchester.

The police checked the body against the National Criminal Intelligence and Missing Persons databases. Neither provided a match. And despite a nationwide media campaign, no one came forward with any information about the identity of the man. He seemed to have no name, no home, no family, and no friends; apart from his body, there was no evidence that this man ever existed at all.

Three questions abounded: Who was this man? Why did he travel 200 miles to die on Saddleworth Moor? And - how can this possibly happen in the modern world?

In The Man On The Moor, Dickins explores the story from the perspective of those searching for missing loved ones. He portrays a man looking for his own missing father. It is this emotional purgatory that forms the main theme of the piece: people who vanish leave their friends and family in an excruciating limbo; not knowing whether their loved ones are dead or alive. What drives someone to disappear? What are they running from or towards? Those left behind do not experience grief, but something different - something more painful, because grief has a resolution; the left behind do not.

See The Man on the Moor at Ledbury's Market Theatre on Saturday, May 26 at 8pm. To book, call the box office on 07967 517125 or visit themarkettheatre.com.