(Image via Sean Hayden)

It's Mental Health Awareness Month, and you can celebrate May 16 by listening to the premiere of the podcast Stage Combat: A Mental Health Story. The podcast is a series about a lead actor who has a mental health crisis at the Goodspeed Opera House in East Haddam, Connecticut. 

It's a compelling story, but while scripted, closely follows what happened to creator Sean Hayden in 2019, when he experienced a panic attack while performing in Billy Elliot, the Musical.

Via statement, Hayden says of his drive to create the podcast:

A mental health crisis could happen to anyone. What if I created a podcast where I show you how a mental health crisis happens? Moment to moment.  What if I could take you right into the Goodspeed Opera House with me and have you experience everything I experienced?  Could that change the way you think about mental health?

The podcast has talkbacks, just like many Broadway shows.

Stage Combat: A Mental Health Story will be on Apple, Spotify, iHeartRadio and all major podcast directories. Follow the show on Instagram.