for theatre portfolio click below
I Didn’t Know I Was Polish / Kaitlyn Kelly
12 Nov 2024 - 16 Nov 2024
Lights up on Kaitlyn, a Canadian expat at a crossroads. After two years of savouring Parisian streets on a youth visa, her time in France is running out. Her parents want her to return home, but Kaitlyn’s heart is firmly anchored in the French capital. Desperate, she consults an immigration lawyer and receives disheartening news. However, a chance call with her sister reveals a surprising family twist: Kaitlyn learns that her Ukrainian grandfather, born amidst the shifting borders of early 20th-century Eastern Europe, was technically Polish. A revelation that could hold the key to a coveted European passport.
As Kaitlyn navigates her unexpected, newfound heritage, she finds that borders and identity are much more nuanced than she thought. Along the way, she reflects on the meaning of home and the truths she's been running from. Will this newfound heritage solve her problems, or is true belonging something deeper than nationality?
Cast & Creatives
Written & Performed by: Kaitlyn Kelly
Directed by: Dominika Uçar
Dramaturgy: Nastazja Domaradzka
Music and sound: Jovana Backovic
BLACK SWANS BY CHRISTINA KETTERING
TRANSLATED BY PAULINE WICK
DIRECTED BY RIA SAMARTZI
Would you trust a robot to take care of your elderly mother?
Two sisters face a difficult decision: how to best care for their elderly mother as her health declines. Rosie, a humanoid care robot, seems like the perfect solution. But soon they have to reckon with the unforeseen consequences of bringing an artificial intelligence into their lives.
Black Swans explores the ethical and moral dilemmas of introducing AI into human caregiving, offering a poignant (and often humorous) look at family dynamics, societal norms and the pervasive influence of technology on our lives.
Christina Kettering‘s award-winning play examines the intersection of AI, healthcare and the challenges of caregiving through a female lens. It prompts questions about the boundaries of AI and the essence of compassion in our increasingly digital world.
Black Swans (Schwarze Schwäne) achieved notable recognition when it was first produced in Germany in 2019, winning first prize at the Heilbronn Drama Competition as part of the Science & Theater festival. It gained further prominence by securing a spot in the 2020 EURODRAM Selection, and has been translated into five different languages.
Ensemble / Camila França as Older Sister Trine Garrett as Younger Sister // Production team Director Ria Samartzi //Lighting Designer
Amy Daniels // Composer/Sound Designer
Jovana Backovic // Dramaturg Nastazja Domaradzka // Associate Lighting Designer Graham Self // Creative Producers
Camila França & Trine Garrett // Associate Producer
Ruth Newbery-Payton // Assistant Production Manager / Technical Stage Manager Lauren Wedgeworth // Engagement Coordinator
Maria Laumark
FAMILY STORIES
FAMILY STORIES DEPOSITS US IN THE MIDDLE OF ONE OF THE BLOODIEST EUROPEAN CONFLICTS SINCE THE SECOND WORLD WAR, WHICH DISMANTLED YUGOSLAVIA IN THE 1990S.
Written by the Serbian playwright Biljana Srbljanović, Family Stories depicts the confused state of affairs into which her country was thrust and addresses the theme of childhood in a series of wild, violent scenarios.
Amid the ruins of war-devastated Yugoslavia, four characters play a game, pretending to be a family, reproducing the delirious behaviour of disoriented adults. Little by little, the logic of war is revealed, created and maintained by the political power manifested at every level of society.
Srbljanović invites us to see the war in a playful light, and the theatre as the place where adults continue to do what children do: create a game.
By Biljana Srbljanović
Directed by Nastazja Domaradzka
Designed by Alice Sales
Lighting design by George Seal
Sound design by Jovana Backovic
Book tickets here
Let Your Hands Sing In The Silence
A performance for one actor - and a migrant community - to recreate their own personal history from memory.
Are we shaped by our memories? If you leave your birthplace behind, does that change what you remember? And what happens when you try to revisit those memories, in a new place?
Robert Lučkay was born in the Hungarian-speaking part of Slovakia in 1976. At least five generations of his family have lived in Kosiče and in the small, rural villages nearby. Over the course of almost ten hours of interviews, Maria Aberg maps his family tree and asks him to recreate what he remembers – and those he remembers – on stage.
In a visual, physical performance that blends documentary theatre with movement and music, The Marlowe’s resident company PROJEKT EUROPA brings together a multilingual, migrant ensemble to share their own memories alongside Lučkay’s, interweaving their stories to create something communal out of what at first seems individual.
Director Maria Aberg
Performer Robert Lučkay
Movement director Ayse Tashkiran
Set and costume designer Ana Inés Jabares-Pita
Associate set & costume design – QianEr Jin
Lighting designer – Cheng Keng
Video designer – Jeffrey Choy
Sound & composition – Jovana Backovic
Three Billion Letters is a theatrical research process where a group of artists use their DNA results as a starting point to develop a new performance for the stage, taking a deeper look into their biological and cultural identities, past and future. How does knowing one's DNA influence our current reality and the path forward as we continue to build a sense of our existence? Could we change the way we see ourselves in relationship with the world around us? Could our DNA results allow us to better understand the past and envision the future?”
When: 2.30PM and 7PM - Tuesday, June 6th 2023
Where: Studio, Greenwich Theatre, Crooms Hill, London SE10 8ES
Text: Julie Tsang and TAKDAJA
Performers: Mimmi Bauer, Pat Dynowska, Michał Szpak
Dramaturgy: Julie Tsang
Light Design: Theodor Spiridon
Scientific Advisor: Michał Szpak
Video Design: Viktors Mileika
Music and Sound: Jovana Backović
Directed by Mimmi Bauer and Theodor Spiridon
Produced by TAKDAJA and Molly Farley
Supported by:
Arts Council England, Greenwich Theatre, Camden People's Theatre, Bathway Theatre/University of Greenwich, Goethe-Institut, Theatre Deli, Queer Britain, Queercircle, University of East Anglia and London LGBT+ Centre.
CACEROLEO
Tue 24th Jan - Sun 29th Jan
19:00,14:45,18:30 (90 mins)
THEATRE
INTERNATIONAL / POLITICAL / SATIRE
Tickets from £17.00
Venue: Crescent
Age Guidance: 18+
THIS EVENT HAS A CONTENT WARNING. CLICK HERE TO DISPLAY.BOOK NOW
Runner Up for the ATG Playwrights Prize: CACEROLEO examines “safe spaces” in the arts from the point of view of a young person who grew up witnessing domestic violence.
“Original and compelling” -Isabella MacPherson, Platform Presents
“Dehumanizing” -Anonymous, Major London Theatre
“Hold onto your butts” -Sam Jackson, Jurassic Park
William Shakespeare
This above all:
To thine own self be true
Hamlet’s father is dead,
His mother remarried (to his uncle),
His uncle is now King.
Told through the eyes and experience of the young characters (yes, the adults are gone) Shakespeare’s monumental play comes to the stage in this contemporary, raw, physical and fast paced ensemble production.
NOT ABOUT NIGHTINGALES
20 Oct - 22 Oct 2022
“As far as the world is concerned, you don’t exist no more.”
Lyrical, muscular, raw and rippling, the great poet-dramatist, Tennesse Williams’ 1930s prison drama offers an unremittingly ugly account of the Depression-era American penal system, based on a true story that is as shocking now as it was nearly a century ago.
When a group of brow-beaten inmates band together on hunger strike to protest the appalling conditions of their incarceration, the brutal Warden Whalen seeks retribution that is vicious, swift and horrifying.
Despite Williams’ huge global success, Not About Nightingales remained virtually unknown and never performed, until its ‘rediscovery’ and world premiere in 1998. Directed by Nastazja Domaradzka and designed by an international all-female team, this production breathes new life into this powerful, claustrophobic and violent tale, flushed with unexpected beauty, humanity and love, in the unlikeliest of places.
Not About Nightingales is performed by graduating students of Bristol School of Acting.
By Tennessee Williams
Directed by Nastazja Domaradzka
Designed by Noemi Daboczi
Lighting design by Lucía Sánchez Roldán
Sound design by Jovana Backovic
NOT ABOUT NIGHTINGALES is presented by special arrangement with the University of the South, Sewanee, Tennessee, USA. This amateur production of “Not About Nightingales” is presented by arrangement with Concord Theatricals Ltd. on behalf of Samuel French Ltd.
www.concordtheatricals.co.uk
A Creative City Project generously funded by Birmingham City Council
Tuesday 12 July – Saturday 16 July 2022
3pm, 4.30pm, 6pm and 7.30pm
Moseley Road Baths
BOSA (meaning barefoot in Croatian) is Notnow Collective’s new adventure. Join us for an immersive experience in the grandiose and atmospheric Moseley Road Baths where we will take you on a spatial audio sound journey.
The BOSA project gathered together four Balkan women artists, three commissioned young creatives and many of the local community who are making their home in Birmingham. With each other, we explored stories and rituals of moving home and settling into a new community.
The performance will be presented using the latest immersive spatial audio technology, giving you the experience of being present with the characters in the story. Notnow Collective have teamed up with Kinicho, who specialise in developing new technologies for spatial audio and bringing to life creative audio experiences in arts and commercial activations. For BOSA, Kinicho will be using their revolutionary Sonic Reality Engine to provide an immersive experience through headphones that track head movements, taking the listener into the world of the story.
BOSA is a creative city project, a part of the Birmingham 2022 Festival, and generously funded by Birmingham City Council and Arts Council England.
BOSA Creative Team
Jovana Backovic – composer
Kristina Gavran – writer
Tina Hofman – creative director
Katherina Radeva – designer
Notnow Collective – producer
Kinicho – spatial audio
Anna-Jane Stilwell voice-over artist
Tim Thomas voice-over artist
Chat and Splash – A Birmingham based community group who have English as a Second/Additional Language.
Claire Bowdler – marketing/audience development
Rachel Gillies – videographer
Fernando – photographer
HOYO
( composition / sound design )
Existing in the intersection of puppetry, virtual reality, haptics and theatre, Hoyo is a show that aims to recreate feeling of the hug within the realms of VR and haptic technologies.
How Long is a Piece of String?
( composition / sound design / interactive electronics )
How Long is a Piece of String? Laugh, learn, play, connect. String and Strong just can’t get along, but what if we could teach them how? Holding hands? Sharing a giggle? What are the things that create a friendship? Join two dancers String and Strong as they create new sound and dance through touch and movement as they try to understand the world around them and each another.
Lucid interval
( Composition / Sound design )
Ever wondered how palpable is the space we come to inhabit between normality and chaos when sudden, shocking loss occurs?
Set on a double bed, Lucid Interval leads the journey into moments when our body and mind play a catch up with reality, and still hold on to the fragments of the very immediate past.
Inspired by our most private places and quiet truths that find way out in a really loud way, Lucid Interval uses riveting, relentless choreography, powerful soundscape and stunning visuals to depict deep, moving and sudden change.
Created and performed by Tina Hofman
Directed – Marcus Fernando
Composer – Jovana Backović
Lighting Design – Jamie Harley
Sound Design – Drew White
Photography – Fernando
Production Management – Laura Stone
Pepper and Honey
( Composition / sound design )
Ana has been on a journey. Croatian born, she’s arrived in the UK, determined to make it home. As she focuses on life in this new land, she is haunted by the voice of her Grandma- calling for her to stay true to national identity and yearning for Ana to come home. As Grandma bakes her traditional Croatian pepper biscuits (believed to bring a loved one back home), will this be enough to be reunited with her granddaughter? But what is “home” to Ana now?
Written by a Croatian playwright and performed by a Croatian actor, Pepper & Honey is a poignant, subtle and timely play about the journey of change, cultural differences, trying not to feel like a foreigner in your adopted country, and the conflict between upholding the traditions of the “old country” and embracing those of the new.
