Introducing our 2023 Resident Artists Theatre Deli is delighted to announce our 2023 programme of residents who will be working with us in Sheffield and London. Theatre Deli will support this talented cohort with space, expertise and funding to develop their work as part of our XL Residency, Classic Residency and Access Residency schemes. Scroll down to meet our 2023 resident artists and explore their projects... A Life of Tea by Gayathiri Kamalakanthan FADE by Alice Christina-Corrigan Paradise Craved by Leo Doulton At Once Before And After by Charlotte Ive Surroundings by Balo Phantasy & Pheromones by Fire and Folie Theatre Kummerspeck or And She Reaches Towards Me by Lilac Yosiphon Bubble Flow Theatre by CharlArt Entertainment A Life of Tea by Gayathiri Kamalakanthan I drink approximately 8 cups of tea a day. A lot of this tea would have started its life on the tea plantations of British-named ‘Ceylon’. ‘The Great British Tea Heist’ of 1848 by the British East India Company, the exploitation of tea-pickers, the forced sterilisation they continue to experience in the name of ‘productivity’, the flooding across tea estates, the climate refugee’s journey to England and my continued love of tea as a Tamil-Brit are difficult realities to hold at once. Questions: If we were more aware of the colonial process our food/drink undergoes, how might our behaviour change? How do refugees participate in home-making and future-building? Who is involved in documenting our stories? How do we talk about history so it feels relevant to the present? About Gayathiri Gayathiri is a Tamil theatre-maker, poet and facilitator. They are interested in how language shapes our sense of belonging and how we use it to queer the future. Gayathiri has developed work with Kali Theatre, 45North and Tamasha. They won the Faber & Andlyn Publisher’s Prize 2022, the Primadonna Fiction Prize 2021 and they were shortlisted for the Bridport Poetry Prize 2022. Gayathiri is currently a member of Griot’s Well and runs the poetry workshop series WORD-BENDERS at The Common Press bookshop in East London.gayathiri.co.uk | Instagram: @unembarrassable FADE by Alice Christina-Corrigan FADE follows twin siblings Cassie and Rubin, as they come to terms with their mother’s sudden death, fading through the past, present and a not-so-distant future, FADE tackles the allyship of siblings, the silent sacrifices we make for each other along the way and aims to educate on the importance in overcoming childhood trauma. FADE is supported by The Lowry, Theatre Deli & Leeds Playhouse & will debut at The Lowry & Leeds Playhouse next year. About Alice Alice Christina-Corrigan is a visually impaired actor, theatre maker & creative access director based in Manchester. Her practice is centred around advancing the technological landscape of creative access in theatre by implementing new and exciting ways to approach creative access. Her work incorporates dynamic sound scores, integrated audio description and creative captioning. Her first production, Past Life toured nationally this year and her second play, FADE is currently in development alongside The Lowry & Theatre Deli, debuting next Spring. Developed With Artist at The LowrySupported by Leeds Playhousehttps://alicechristina.wixsite.com | Instagram: @aliceccorrigan | Twitter: @aliceccorrigan Paradise Craved by Leo Doulton We meet an angel, sat onstage with cobbled-together wings made out of scraps of cheap magazines and leaflets. It gestures at a horribly imbalanced chess board and says: “Be not afraid. “Please be not afraid. “I know I am not what I was.” Paradise Craved is an interactive immersive ritual about belonging, doomed fights against higher powers, and trying to survive being lost in the city. It’s partly an ongoing obsession with ‘Paradise Lost’, an epic poem about the Fall of Satan and his craving for liberty and the love of the deity that destroyed him, partly a reflection on how ideas of ‘Paradise’ have changed in my half-Pakistani lifetime, and partly an interest in how different cultures think about angels. Interactive immersive theatre audiences are used to being asked to win; to overcome an obstacle. I want to explore what happens when you ask them to merely be; to try and bear losing with the angel as it replays its own downfall again and again. What rites might they perform to try and win the unwinnable war? Beyond that, the residency will be exploring whether to keep the show small and intimate, or try and capture the impossibly large scale of Milton’s war in heaven. About Leo Doulton Leo Doulton is a writer and director working in opera, theatre, and interactive forms. As a director, Leo has been a 2022 JMK Award Finalist, a 2022 Opera Awards Foundation Bursary recipient, and was longlisted for the 2019 Offie Award for Best Opera. As a writer-director, highlights include Come Bargain With Uncanny Things (2022), We Sing/I Sang (2020), and The Perfect Opera (2019). As a writer, Leo’s work includes libretti and translations for the Royal Opera House, Scottish Opera, and Arcola Theatre/Grimeborn, and has been supported by a 2021 Britten Pears Foundation Creative Retreat. https://www.leodoulton.com | Facebook: @LeoDoultonOfficial | Twitter: @leodoulton At Once Before And After by Charlotte Ive Somewhere on the coast, passing the time between the tides, four women tell stories of themselves and recount the ones told about them. Who belongs? Who doesn’t? Who decides and why? About Charlotte I am an Off West End Award nominated director, writer, dramaturg and facilitator. A lot of my background is in bringing new writing from the germ of an idea to final production. I co-founded and was the artistic director of my own theatre company, Scrawny Cat, and direct and produce new writing, classics and contemporary writers at a variety of fringe venues, site specific spaces and outdoors. I am deeply collaborative, working very closely with a cohort of actor/musicians; together we interrogate, investigate and create dynamic, queer work that aims to centre female voices and perspectives from the margins. clippings.me/charleyive | Instagram: @chive26 | Twitter: @Charley_Ive Surroundings by Balo Surroundings is a tour of immersive installation performances in unique spaces. The project is led by Manon McCoy (harp/electronics) and Will Shaw (drums/electronics) as their duo Balo, working in collaboration with live-sound engineer Emma Lambert. The performance features a speaker array spread across the space around the live performers. In Sheffield they will be joined by Jez Matthews (keys/synths) and Hannah Brady (clarinet/saxophone) who perform under the duo Whale Detective. In Manchester the collaboration will involve visual-artist Luca Shaw who will create immersive projections. In Liverpool they will be working with Lucas McCoy, a visual artist exploring scale through large live illustration work. The performances will be an open installation encouraging audiences to move through the space and come and go as they feel throughout the performance.Surroundings is an invitation to audiences to reimagine the spaces around them. About Balo Balo are Sheffield based harpist Manon McCoy and drummer Will Shaw. The duo create expansive works for harp, drums and live electronics. Their sound is a dynamic balance of driving rhythmic phrasing, ambient textures, intricate prepared techniques and experimental electronic layers. Their recent work has developed into site-specific live-sound installations. Balo are particularly interested in alternative approaches to live performance and are currently working on a series of accessibility focused performances to engage with more diverse audiences. Supported by the University of Sheffield. https://www.manonmccoymusic.com/balo | Instagram: @balo.project | Facebook: @balo.project Phantasy & Pheromones by Fire and Folie Theatre Phantasy & Pheromones is a piece of new musical theatre exploring the world of relationships, intimacy, and online sex work. With the project in its early stages, our company is in the early process of conducting interviews and workshops to find its story and sound. Follow the work of Fire and Folie Theatre as they work with Theatre Deli to develop what is bound to be an engaging piece of political theatre.About Fire and Folie Theatre CJ Simon (Playwright and Creative Facilitator), Alice Copestick (Composer-Lyricist), and Jaime-Leigh (Producer-Lyricist) come together for the first musical project of Fire and Folie Theatre, a company dedicated to producing research-led and impact focused pieces of art. Fire and Folie is a writer led company which looks to engage with poetry, movement, and mulitmedia tools to produce politically engaged art. They currently have work being developed with Sheffield Theatres and Theatre Deli, with hopes to take to the stage in 2024.https://www.cjsimonwrites.com/ Kummerspeck or And She Reaches Towards Me by Lilac Yosiphon Kummerspeck is a bilingual exploration of emotional eating as a response to crisis and loss, in both British Sign Language & English. When literally translated from German, ‘Kummerspeck’ means ‘grief bacon’. It refers to the impulse to overeat when dealing with trauma. Earlier development of Kummerspeck has been supported by Arts Council England, Theatre Clwyd and Graeae, as part of their Beyond programme. About Lilac Lilac is a writer-director and the Artistic Director of Althea Theatre. She is the RTYDS Resident Assistant Director at Curve and the recipient of the inaugural Annie Castledine Award. She has previously been endorsed by Arts Council England as a promising Exceptional Talent in the UK. Directing credits include: Oh What A Lovely War (Made at Curve co-production with De Montfort University); I Want to Live (rehearsed reading, Theatre Royal Stratford East); Stuck With You (Crips Without Constraints Part 2, Graeae); Kaleidoscopes (rehearsed reading, Criterion Theatre, West End).. Credits as Resident Assistant Director include: Billy Elliot The Musical and The Wizard of Oz (Curve, Leicester). Credits as Associate Director include: Robin Hood (Derby Theatre, dir. Sarah Brigham) and 10 Nights (Graeae and Tamasha in association with Bush Theatre, dir. Kash Arshad, Olivier Award nominated for an Olivier Award for Outstanding Achievement in an Affiliate Theatre dir. Kash Arshad). Credits as Assistant Director include: The Tempest R&D (Graeae, dir. Jenny Sealey), A Midsummer Night's Dream (Butterfly Theatre, dir. Aileen Gonslaves). Lilac was an MGCFutures Bursary recipient in 2021, and a finalist for the JMK Award 2019 and Peter Hall Award 2021. She also directs and facilitates workshops for Graeae, Mountview, Guildhall, RADA and National Youth Theatre. www.lilacyosiphon.com | Twitter: @LilachYosiphon Manage Cookie Preferences