The Bread & Roses Theatre

Innovative & award-winning fringe theatre in Clapham, upstairs at The Bread & Roses Pub


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  • Home
  • Donations
  • What's On
  • About
    • Theatre
    • Team
    • News
    • Find Us
  • Playwriting
    • Playwriting Award >
      • Playwriting Award 2021 onwards
      • Playwriting Award 2018/2019
      • Playwriting Award 2016/2017
      • Playwriting Competition 2015
    • Playwrights Circle
    • Publications
    • Short Plays for The Platform
  • Opportunities
    • Bring a Show
    • Networking Event
    • Joining the Team
    • Emerging Companies Award
    • Emerging Director & Producer
    • Newsletters
    • Equal Opportunities Policy

2021 Here We Come: Emerging Company Award, New Team Members, Continued Closure.

8/1/2021

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Happy New Year! May 2021 be a year of recovery. Whilst we remain closed due to the national lockdown we are hopeful for a full programme later in the year and look forward to welcoming back visiting companies and audiences at some unkown, unpredictable, uncertain point this year. In the meantime we continue to battle for our own survival with the uncertainties ahead, but are also glad to have some good news in store to kick off the year.

The Bread & Roses Emerging Company Award 2021 open for submissions

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Thanks to funding from the Culture Recovery Fund, we are able to go ahead with The Bread & Roses Emerging Company Award 2021, which will offer an emerging BAME/BIPoC*-led theatre company a one-week funded research and development (R&D) period, envisaged for March 2021, with the additional possibility of a professional production run at the theatre at a later point.
*See full details and information on how to apply here.
Deadline is January 31st, 2021.

Welcoming new team members

With much delay - after the 2020 whirlwind and hold up on particularly in-house projects - we have finally found our new Associate Producer: Natalie Chan.

Natalie is a producer from Hong Kong and now based in London. She works in the fundraising team for Creative Youth Charity and is a recipient of the Blackbaud Scholarship for pursuing a part time MA in Philanthropic Studies at the University of Kent.
Recent highlights include working with BFI Network to deliver fundraising workshops and producing Dumbledore Is So Gay which won the VAULT Festival’s Origins Award 2020. She previously trained as Resident Assistant Producer at Theatre503 and worked as Box Office Deputy Manager for Pleasance Theatre Trust.​
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Also joining the team is Lynne McConway as our newly appointed Finance & Funding Manager.

​Lynne is an independent producer and arts fundraiser. She left a career in the City three years ago to pursue a career in theatre and produced Vibrant 2017 and Returning to Haifa, both at Finborough Theatre , and Tiger Mum at VAULT festival 2020. Lynne was Assistant Producer in 2018 at Vicky Graham Productions where she worked on Thor & Loki at Edinburgh Fringe. In 2019, she was awarded a Stage One New Producer bursary.
Most recently, Lynne worked with Iris Theatre as Fundraising Coordinator raising funds for their summer seasons and a Covid19 emergency appeal. She was also responsible for bid writing and fundraising as part of her role as Line Producer with Flute Theatre.

We welcome them both to the team and are very excited to have them on board to work on the theatre's survival and growth, as for the time being the future remains uncertain.

We are incredibly grateful for the funding, donations and support we have received throughout this troubling time, but continue being reliant on further help whilst on lockdown or pyhsical-distancing-restrictions. If you can support us in keeping fringe theatre alive and exciting, we are grateful for any donations. 
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The Bread & Roses Theatre receives lifeline grant from Government’s £1.57 billion Culture Recovery Fund

17/10/2020

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The Bread & Roses Theatre has been awarded £50.000 as part of the Government’s £1.57 billion Culture Recovery Fund (CRF) to help face the challenges of the coronavirus pandemic and to ensure they have a sustainable future, the Culture Secretary has announced today. 

The Bread & Roses Theatre is one of 588 cultural and creative organisations across the country receiving urgently needed support – with £76 million of investment announced today. This follows £257 million awarded earlier in the week to 1,385 organisations, also from the Culture Recovery Fund grants programme being administered by Arts Council England on behalf of the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. Further rounds of funding in the cultural and heritage sector are due to be announced over the coming weeks.

The Bread & Roses Theatre is a fringe venue, which opened in 2014 above The Bread & Roses Pub in Clapham (South London). Artistic quality, equality and representation of our society's real diversity are at the forefront of the theatre's programming, which features visiting companies as well as in-house productions, with a focus on new writing, underrepresented voices and distinctive work. The Bread & Roses Theatre has always aimed to support theatremakers as much as possible by providing box office split deals, keeping overheads and running costs as low as possible and thereby, so far, surviving on mainly ticket sales alone. However, this meant that the impact of the necessary Covid-19 measures and restrictions has hit the theatre particularly hard, with extremely limited resources to fall back on.

After an initial lifeline from Lambeth Culture and Arts at Risk funding package that helped the venue through the spring/summer closure, the grant from the Culture Recovery Fund will now support The Bread & Roses Theatre in continuing its work and outreach in the months ahead. Currently the theatre is open under strict physical distancing and hygiene measures, as well as with a very limited seating capacity. Now The Bread & Roses Theatre can continue its support towards visiting companies, has some more security for in-house projects and outreach programmes aimed at emerging and underrepresented artists, and thus can carry on providing audiences and artists with innovative events and programming.

Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden said:  “This is more vital funding to protect cultural gems across the country, save jobs and prepare the arts to bounce back. Through Arts Council England we are delivering the biggest ever investment in the arts in record time. Hundreds of millions of pounds are already making their way to thousands of organisations.
“These awards build on our commitment to be here for culture in every part of the country.”

Chair, Arts Council England, Sir Nicholas Serota, said: “Culture is an essential part of life across the country, helping to support people’s wellbeing through creativity and self-expression, bringing communities together, and fuelling our world class creative industries.  
“This latest set of awards from the Culture Recovery Fund builds on those announced recently and will help hundreds of organisations to survive the next few months, ensuring that the cultural sector can bounce back after the crisis.  We will continue doing everything we can to support artists and cultural and creative organisations, with further funding to be announced in the coming weeks.”
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Rebecca Pryle, Tessa Hart & Velenzia Spearpoint, Co-Directors of The Bread & Roses Theatre, said: “We are so grateful for this lifeline grant and all the support received throughout this challenging time, as when the arts are under threat, they become more important than ever. Just like many of the artists we work with, we have not followed the established paths, but paved our own, and continue to do so; nowadays even working across countries and Brexit borders.
We now gear up to move forward with even more strength and creativity, to break through ceilings and barriers, to make sure that Black lives matter, to keep learning and improving and questioning and challenging ourselves and to do everything we can to keep fringe theatre alive, diverse and exciting.” 

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What's been going on? What's happening next?

7/8/2020

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Like everyone we have had a lot on our plates to juggle and make through these past months. We would like to thank everyone who has been sending us support (be it in the form of donations, creative inputs or kind words), and as we all continue to look at the uncertain times ahead, we are now gearing up for what’s ahead and have some news and updates.
 
Funding Announcement
When the theatre first closed under the conditions of lockdown it was scary times for our industry. At the B&R, seeing the months stretching out before us it was hard to see how we could come out the other side. We are delighted to announce that we have been awarded £10,000 from Lambeth Council under the terms of their Lambeth Culture and Arts at Risk funding package.

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The news of the success of our application came at a particularly low point and gave us all a huge and hopeful boost. The Bread and Roses building has long been a centre point for the Clapham Community boasting a long, rich history of union action and fundraising. The theatre takes it lead from those ideals by supporting diversity and providing opportunity for creative expression to find roots in the area. It was encouraging to be thrown this lifeline which will allow us to continue to uphold these values. Thank you Lambeth Council!!!
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Re-Opening (hopefully)
While we continue to keep our finger in the ever-changing winds of the government guidelines regarding the re-opening of entertainments venues, we are assuming for now - based on the current decisions – that we can re-open this month!
 
We have lined up the fantastic Integrity Theatre with their show F*ck Off, running 25th to 29th August with two shows a day, as we are, of course, operating with limited seating capacity as well as appropriate physical distancing and hygiene measures in place. Find all details here and we hope to see you soon!

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Playwrights Circle
Like everyone, we have adapted over lockdown and found ways to continue to bring our theatre community together. It became more important to us than ever that we provide a space for creatives to meet, exchange ideas and hear feedback.  So, we joined the growing family of Zoom acolytes and took our hugely popular Playwrights Circle, online!
 
Perhaps because of the shareability and convenience factors we’ve been thrilled to welcome many new faces to the group during this time and have also reconnected with some old faces who were once again able to attend from outside London. We will continue online sessions but also evaluate when in the coming weeks or months the traditional meet-ups will be possible again. Hopefully the group will continue to grow so we urge any interested parties to get in touch and register their interest! We’d love to hear from actors who are keen to read, writers who’d like to platform some work and anyone interested in sitting in. The coming dates and details can be found here: Playwrights Circle.

Emerging Producer/Director Scheme
One of The Bread & Roses Theatre’s successful initiatives is that which offers support and nurturing to an up and coming Theatre Director and a Theatre Producer, each year. This is known as the Associate Emerging Director/ Producer scheme, which offers the possibility to learn and work on in-house projects, as well as receive support towards their own endeavours. These placements begin in the early months of the year and we were excited to welcome Tom Ward (ED) and Rosie Sharp (EP) in to the team in February 2020. Given the restrictions COVID-19 since placed on the theatre we will not be able to offer the amount of work experience and support in 2020 normally part of the schemes, hence we will be rolling Rosie and Tom’s placements over in to 2021 as well. This means the application process for the next ED & EP scheme will not be open (as is usual) end of this year, but only again in 2021.

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Rosie Sharp (Emerging Producer 2020/2021)
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Tom Ward (Emerging Director 2020/2021)

​Donations 
We cannot express how hugely grateful we are for every donation we have received from supporters of the theatre. With the uncertain landscape before us we know that every penny will be vital to the survival of the theatre over the next year or so. Even being (potentially) open we will operate with hugely limited capacity and plan to offer box office splits in larger favour towards the visiting companies during this time, in order to also support them in their struggle to continue their creative work. Therefore, we continue to be grateful for any further donations and have some great incentives on offer too (such as paying for our loo roll, or naming a chair…). You can donate here.
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Temporary Covid-19 Closure extended

24/3/2020

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Following our previous announcement we are extending the theatre's temporary closure and postponement of shows until 16th May 2020.  As before we will continue reviewing the situation on a day by days basis and see if it will be feasible to reopen after this date. We are also aiming to reschedule the cancelled shows wherever possible.

HOW YOU CAN HELP SUPPORT ARTISTS DURING COVID-19 CLOSURE

* Donate to visiting companies
Any 'would have been' audience can contribute to a donation pot which will be going fully to the visiting companies whose shows have had to be cancelled (proportionally distributed based on how many nights they would have played) - find out more on our starting page.

* Buy a playtext
Bring a little theatre home, discover new writing & support a playwright by purchasing one of our published plays here.

* Share & connect
Stay in touch with us & share our posts! If you have any queries, want to support us further, enquire about programming or just want to drop us a line, you can do so at info@breadandrosestheatre.co.uk
 
Stay safe and healthy & we hope to welcome you back to The Bread & Roses Theatre soon.

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Show Postponements due to Covid-19

16/3/2020

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After much contemplation and careful consideration, we have concluded, with a heavy heart, that considering the pandemic spread of Covid-19 and the associated dangers, we will sadly be closing The Bread & Roses Theatre and cancel all shows until 13th April 2020. We will continue reviewing the situation on a day by days basis and see if it will be feasible to reopen after this date.

Like many fringe theatres, we have absolutely no public funding and rely on ticket sales but found this to be the most responsible decision for us to take at this stage to protect our staff, artists, guests and the wider society.

We will contact all ticketholders and offer the possibility to receive a full refund or donate their ticket money to the visiting company. We would also like to ask further would have been audience members to consider contributing to a donation pot which would be going fully to the visiting companies  (proportionally distributed based on how many performances they would have had). We will also aim to reschedule events wherever possible.
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Stay safe and healthy!
In solidarity,
Rebecca, Tessa & Velenzia
The Bread & Roses Theatre team
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Going Straight to Gay (or somewhere in-between)

13/1/2020

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Ahead of Henriette Laursens' new solo-show opening at the Bread & Roses Theatre, we chatted with her about Going Straight to Gay (or somewhere in-between)...

What inspired you to create this show? Why this story?
As straight forward as it may sound my first gay relationship inspired this piece. I suddenly found myself in situations I’d never experienced in straight relationships, and as frustrating as it was, it’s just as funny looking back. I have an anthropology degree so I always saw myself as someone who was not defined by gender stereotypes, but being with a woman I learned that I’m just as much part of it as anyone else. I suddenly had to redefine myself as a partner, when I no longer had the gender stereotypes to fall back on. Furthermore, I experienced people treating us differently and we became the object of attention without doing anything other than show affection for one another. We were being sexualized for being in love. That was tough. I think this piece can help cast some light on how we see gender and relationships and hopefully the more we do so, it can make it a bit easier for LGBT+ community in the future. 

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What have been some of the highlights in the development of Going Straight to Gay?
I love to use my experiences from my own life and turn them into stories and scripts. I think the main highlight has been taking some of the episodes that really challenged me throughout my relationships and make them into something we can all laugh at. Not to neglect the importance of it, but instead to not let it control the here and now. If we can’t laugh about it, then what can we do?

Who should see this show?
Anyone who has ever dated anyone or been in a relationship. And if you’ve never dated anyone, but are interested in knowing something about it, this is also the show for you. My show covers not only my experiences with homo-sexual relationship but it also covers my experiences with former straight relationships. I think everyone who sees my show can recognise a thing or two from their own relationship whether that being with or without a same sex partner. And in the end this show is all about having a laugh, so if you like a laugh, this show is for you.

What attracted you to stage this production at The Bread & Roses Theatre?
This is in many ways a very personal piece, so I needed the performance venue to be somewhere with the experience and support of LGBT+ community. This is exactly why The Bread & Roses Theatre was a perfect fit.



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A Writer's thoughts – 'Maisie' by Roger Goldsmith

25/11/2019

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When I started writing plays I wrote conventional plays, mostly based on real life situations, stories I came across, or read about, sometimes with lots of characters, sometimes not.
'It Started With A Touch' a play about a Mother who witnesses her son beating up an innocent man, reporting him to the police, and her son being sent to prison, was my first London production, part of Wimbledon Studio's Fresh Ideas, and later ' Runaway' a two- hander loosely based on the Jeremy Forrest situation, a schoolteacher eloping with a schoolgirl to France, produced by Small But Mighty Theatre in Toronto.
It wasn't until I met Colin Burden the Artistic Director of The Bootleg Theatre Company in Salisbury that I ever regarded monologues as plays, or could be, that they could have value dramatically. It was something I had never considered. Who would want to come watch one person on a stage telling a story? Where's the 'drama' in that? What's the point? You may as well read a book or listen to the radio!
But I thought I'd give it a try. I wrote a play called 'Torched' sent it to Colin, he liked it and together with another monologue by Annie L Cooper entitled 'Cookie' forming a double bill under the title
of 'Deal With It', it was staged at Barons Court Theatre and toured the south west, very successfully and got great reviews.

It was followed by another monologue I wrote entitled 'Birth' about a lonely vicar's daughter, a virgin, who is raped , gets pregnant and has the child of her attacker, and her life is changed for the better because of it, winner of the Lost Theatre's One Act play festival, and perhaps the most successful to date. And 'Brotherly Love' about a brother's unhealthy love for his sister, which played at Barons Court a while back. I began to see the value in monologues. They weren't such a bad idea after all. And far better writers than me had proved they worked.


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A Writer's Thoughts - Under the Radar by Jonathon Crewe

25/10/2019

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In August 2017, journalist Kim Wall joined inventor Peter Madsen on a voyage on his private submarine, the UC3 Nautilus.  She was there to conduct an interview she'd requested earlier that year.  She never returned.  
 
When I first read about this story, I was struck by the discussions and number of comments that returned to the same question - why did she go on that submarine alone with a stranger?  
 
To which, the only response can be - why shouldn't she have?  Would you have asked the same question if she were a man?  Should she have changed her behaviour, not done her job, because she was a woman?  
 
It was this reaction to the crime that inspired me to write Under the Radar.  Regardless of the abhorrent actions of Madsen, there is a portion of society who resort to blaming the victim, an extension of questioning rape victims' veracity because they were dressed in revealing clothes or under the influence of alcohol or drugs.  Should a woman's behaviour change because of how a man might react?  Should we go further and suggest women shouldn't step into a taxi alone, or go home with a man, or feel free to walk home on her own?  Should a woman ever feellike she has to behave differently to a man?  
 
It may be coincidence, but only a year before, a recording of the future President of the United States was released with him bragging about how he approached women and that, because he was famous, he 'can do anything.  Grab 'em by the pussy.  You can do anything.'


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Winners of The Bread & Roses Playwriting Award 2018/2019

25/9/2019

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The Bread & Roses Theatre announces the three winners of the Bread & Roses Playwriting Award 2018/2019 as:

  • Hungerland by Rachel O'Regan
  • I and the Village by D Donohue
  • Who You Are and What You Do by Hugh Dichmont

  • All three plays will receive a professional production and publication throughout 2019/2020.

Grown out of the Bread & Roses Playwriting Competition, the biennial award was launched in 2016, with the current round opening for submissions in 2018 and calling for full length theatre plays that feature at least half of female, non-binary or gender-neutral roles by Europe based writers. Over 400 submissions were judged anonymously throughout three readings rounds.
The Bread & Roses Theatre would like to thank their numerous readers for their dedication and feedback, as well as all the writers who submitted their work.
 
‘We are once again really impressed with the standard and breadth of work submitted. This has been our second time running the award and has fallen into an unexpectedly busy time for us. In-between the call-out for submissions and the announcement of the winners, we have changed Artistic Director and opened a second location, so it’s been a time full of changes and growth. But now with The Bread & Roses Theatre’s fifth anniversary on the horizon, we’re excited to be presenting one of the winning plays as our first in-house production in the last year and a half for the occasion.’ – Tessa Hart (Executive Director)

  • Hungerland by Rachel O'Regan, directed by Rebecca Pryle & Velenzia Spearpoint
Tue to Sat, 29th October to 9th November 2019
+ The Bread & Roses Theatre’s 5th Anniversary on Friday 1st November 2019!
Nicole is making Christmas dinner. Her twin sister Alice is coming to stay, but she doesn’t like gravy or potatoes or turkey. In fact, she struggles to eat almost anything. When Alice turns up on Nicole’s doorstep on Christmas Day, she threatens to expose her secrets and unravel her carefully constructed new life. Nicole tries to get Alice to leave before Mike can meet her, but Alice wants a relationship – and her half of their shared inheritance.

  • I and the Village by D Donohue
Tue to Sat, 21st April to 2nd May 2020
‘I and the Village’ follows three African women living in the Direct Provision System, the system asylum seekers must enter while awaiting a decision on their applications in Ireland. Keicha and Jeta have shared a room together for years, their memories and fantasies merging into one story of longing and survival. When eighteen-year-old Hannah arrives, she finds herself swept up in their reality and must fight to maintain her sense of identity.

  • Who You Are and What You Do by Hugh Dichmont
Tue to Sat, 27th October to 7th November 2020
‘Who You Are and What You Do’ is made up of five narratives exploring the various ways we seek happiness.
 
Further details on the productions will be announced in due course.
Submissions for the next Bread & Roses Playwriting Award will open in 2020. 

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Maria Makenna on women in theatre & Esmond Road's all-female production of The Bacchae

11/9/2019

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I’ve been in love with the theatre since I was 12 years old. I spent my pubescent years with copies of Macbeth and Angels in America and Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? in constant rotation. Until finishing school, there was never any question in my mind where I would spend my life and career.
 
The gradual melting away of my childhood dreams of the stage began when, at 18, enrolled in America’s oldest drama conservatory in Manhattan, the casting announcements for our first year finals were posted. Eagerly dragging my finger down the list of plays, one of which was Wendy Wasserstein’s love letter to second-wave feminism, ‘Uncommon Women and Others’, I found my name nestled sadly near the bottom of the cast list for a self-indulgent modern drama called ‘Boy’s Life’. The name of the character to the left of my own was simply ‘Girl’. I would later discover that the director’s choice to cast me as this sad, nameless, stereotype of a  woman was made for one reason alone: I was quiet, reserved, and uncomfortable in my skin. As far as the programme directors at this historical institution were concerned, if I had any hope of working as an actress, I needed to get comfortable wearing lingerie onstage.
 
So ended my first and last year in American drama school; draped in translucent silk and running my mouth over the body of a man I could barely stand to share a room with, trying my best to exude confidence in front of a room full of (mostly male) authority figures. It didn’t work. I wasn’t invited back.


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The Bread & Roses Theatre
68 Clapham Manor Street, Clapham SW4 6DZ, London

Ticket purchases are non refundable. Concession prices apply to students; under 18s; pensioners; those on disability and unemployment benefits; Equity, BECTU & SDUK members; Portico Places cardholders. ​As a young venue we are still upgrading and developing the space, any additional donations are much appreciated and will be used towards improving the theatre even further and keeping the venue going in the long-term.

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Commended "Most Innovative Arts Project"  2018

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​Phone: 020 8050 3025 | info@breadandrosestheatre.co.uk
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Company Number 9700840), 2012-2021 | Disclaimer/Privacy Policy


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