Women’s voices are always centre stage for Damsel Productions. They now premiere their fifth female-led play, Tabitha Mortiboy’s The Amber Trap, with a limited run season at London’s Theatre503 next month.
The Amber Trap, directed by Hannah Hauer-King, runs at Theatre503 from 24 April to 18 May 2019, with a press night on 29 April.
“Some bones are like ice. They’re weaker than you’d think.”
Katie and her girlfriend Hope work at their local corner shop, where the days pass in quiet, comfortable rhythms. For Katie, the little shop is a sanctuary. A place where she can hold onto Hope without anybody watching. But when new employee Michael arrives, the sands start to shift and the air begins to thicken.
In this chilling portrait of craving and control, Olivia Rose Smith is Katie, Fanta Barrie is Hope, Misha Butler is Michael and Jenny Bolt is Jo.
The premiere production is designed by Jasmine Swan, with lighting by Lucy Adams and sound by Annie May Fletcher. It’s produced by Kitty Wordsworth for Damsel Productions.
Olivia Rose Smith, Misha Butler, Fanta Barrie & Jenny Bolt
Bios
Fanta Barrie plays Hope. Her theatre credits include The Cereal Café (The Other Palace) and Songlines (Assembly, Roxy). Jenny Bolt plays Jo. Her theatre credits include Electra (Old Vic), A Long Way From Home (Tricycle Theatre), Dark Tourism andThe Last Room I Checked (Arcola Theatre). Misha Butler plays Michael. His theatre credits include Jess and Joe Forever (Stephen Joseph Theatre) and The Winslow Boy (UK tour). Olivia Rose Smith plays Katie. Her theatre credits include Conditionally (Soho Theatre) and Tiger Country (Hampstead Theatre).
Tabitha Mortiboy
Playwright Tabitha Mortiboy began her writing career in Bristol, where she had several short plays staged and where her first full-length play Billy Through the Window premiered at the Wardrobe Theatre in 2015. Billy later transferred to Theatre503 and to Underbelly at the Edinburgh Fringe, where it was shortlisted for the Brighton Fringe Excellence Award. In the same year, she was selected to work for a year on attachment to Bristol Old Vic as part of their Open Sessions scheme. In 2016 her second play Beacons was produced at the Park Theatre, London. Beacons was nominated for three Off West End Awards including Best New Play and Most Promising New Playwright, and is now being developed for radio. In 2017, she co-wrote Bare Skin on Briny Waters for the Edinburgh Fringe, where it received a commendation for writing in the NSDF Edinburgh Award. As well as creating her own work, she writes alongside Bellow Theatre (Supported Artists at Hull Truck Theatre and Emerging Company at New Diorama Theatre), a company she co-founded in 2013.
Director Hannah Hauer-King‘s work lies primarily in new writing, adaptation and narratives with female-drive and/or LGBTQ themes. Her theatre credits include The Funeral Director (Southwark Playhouse and UK tour 2019), Fabric. Fury (Soho Theatre), Grotty, Breathe (Bunker Theatre), Revolt. She Said. Revolt Again (RCSSD), Clay (Pleasance Theatre), Witt ‘n Camp (Edinburgh Fringe, Assembly Rooms), Dry Land (Jermyn Street Theatre), Hypernormal (Vaults Festival), and Dead Playwright (ORL Theatre). Associate credits include Romeo and Juliet (Shakespeare’s Globe), Radiant Vermin (Soho Theatre) and Daytona (Theatre Royal Haymarket).
Hannah Hauer-King and Kitty Wordsworth co-founded Damsel Productions in 2015 to place women’s voices centre stage. Damsel Productions hopes to be one cog in a larger and crucial movement addressing both the misrepresentation and under-representation of women in theatre.
The idea is simple: to bring together women directors, producers, designers and all other creatives to breathe life into scripts exclusively written by women. Damsel Productions aim to provoke, inspire and entertain with true and honest representations of the female experience.
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- Fabric
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- Brute
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- Dry Land
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- Fury
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- Grotty
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- Siblings
Critically successful productions include the UK premiere of Ruby Rae Spiegel’s Dry Land (Jermyn Street Theatre), Izzy Tennyson’s Brute (Soho Theatre), Phoebe Eclair-Powell’s Fury (Soho Theatre), Izzy Tennyson’s Grotty (The Bunker) and Abi Zakarian’s Fabric (Soho Theatre & London community centre Tour). Damsel also recently produced London’s first-ever all women directing festival Damsel Develops at the Bunker Theatre.
