ABOUT ME

 

I am a playwright, screenwriter, anthropologist, activist (working primarily as a disability and mental health advocate), author, and public speaker.

 

For the past few years I have primarily been working as a playwright (you can find out more about my stage work on the Playwriting page). My first non-fiction book Happy Death Club is published in May 2024 by 404 Ink, and I am currently working on a second non-fiction book, and my first novel. 

 

ACTIVISM

 

I am the founder and co-artistic director of Little but Fierce Theatre, a fringe theatre company created by and for female and non-binary creatives who identify as disabled or neurodivergent. We produce plays by disabled, D/deaf, and neurodivergent female/non-binary writers and directors, featuring at least 50% female/non-binary characters, though the plays don't necessarily need to be about disability. We have produced award-winning plays at Vault Festival (including the critically acclaimed 'Batman', a collaborative interactive stage play about grief, true crime, and the first person trauma industrial complex, and the verbatim play ZINA, written by a first-time Muslim playwright exploring how she reconciled her religious faith with her career as a dominatrix), we co-produced a production of Charles Dickens' 'A Christmas Carol' with the Royal Shakespeare Company at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford upon Avon; we were commissioned by the London Mayor's office to create the audio walking tour scavenger hunt 'Londoninium', and in 2019 we even took the lesbian romantic-comedy 'Puppy' to Santiago Chile.

 

Little but Fierce recently won a Royal Society of Literature award, to run a series of free playwriting workshops for emerging disabled and neurodivergent writers, and to host a showcase of short pieces and monologues by selected writers.

 

We are also partners and co-organisers of the National Inclusive Theatre Day, an event for secondary school and sixth form students with SEND, which is being developed in partnership with two of the biggest theatres in London, and should be launched in spring 2025.

 

I also created 'Grassroots', an initiative that is part of the Barnes Film Festival (and delivered with support from our host the Bush Theatre), to provide free workshops, support and resources for young people from disadvantaged and marginalised backgrounds to help them to make their first short film.

 

I am also involved privately in disability and mental health activism, and sometimes this spills over into my work. For example, I have been involved in two separate platform theatre productions, devised with members of a North London disability organisation, and have written and performed pieces for a pop-up protest theatre staged by Disabled People Against Cuts on the pavement outside Downing Street, and have attended events at 10 Downing Street and at the House of Commons and House of Lords to lobby politicians to provide more support for disabled people.

 

I am currently a member of Triple C's mental health task force, and have previously sat on various other task forces and boards within a theatre or arts context.

 

 

EDUCATION

I hold a Joint BA (Hons) degree in Anthropology and Journalism, an MSc in Anthropology, an MSc in Applied Neuroscience, and I started but did not complete a PhD in Neuroanthropology. My focus within my academic study was primarily mental illness and gender, and I also studied death rituals cross-culturally.