Cast Set For BELLY OF THE BEAST at Finborough Theatre

The cast has been announced for the world premiere of Belly of the Beast, an award-winning new play from a debut playwright, Saana Sze. The production opens at the Finborough Theatre for a four week limited season on Tuesday, 7 January 2025.

YoungMartha, a bright and agreeable student, falls in love with Gia, who has had enough of school and teachers that don’t care about girls like her…

NowMartha enters the teaching industry, optimistic about making a positive change, but soon begins a quick journey towards disillusionment when they realise the corporate hell they’re in…

Black, non-binary and queer, YoungMartha and NowMartha are set against rigid systems which insist they conform.

Belly of the Beast examines school politics, from the standpoint of both student and a teacher, as it asks “What are schools for?”

Playwright Saana Sze is a queer British-Ugandan writer/educator, living in East London. They worked in Front of House theatre for over three years. Their first theatre commission, Claudia Jones, was created for a young audience with Blue Elephant Theatre, as part of BET’s Celebrating Black Voices series. Belly of the Beast is Saana's first full length play, and won the 2022 ETPEP Award.

Director Dadiow Lin was the winner of the 2019 Genesis Future Directors Award. She was the 2022 Resident Assistant Director at Donmar Warehouse, and was also a participant in the 2023 National Theatre Directors' Course.  Direction includes Henry V: Schools' Tour (Donmar Warehouse), The Winter's Tale, Light Falls, The Motherfucker with the Hat and Monster (Royal Academy of Dramatic Art), a staged reading of Not Yet Midnight (Royal Court Theatre), Miss Julie (Storyhouse, Chester, and National Tour) and In A Word (The Young Vic). Associate and Assistant Direction includes Love's Labour's Lost, directed by Emily Burns (Royal Shakespeare Company), Peggy For You, directed by Richard Wilson (Hampstead Theatre), and The Band's Visit, directed by Michael Longhurst, A Doll's House Part 2, directed by James Macdonald, and Henry V, directed by Max Webster (Donmar Warehouse).
Producer Clarisse Makundul returns to the Finborough Theatre where she produced the UK premiere of Emmanuel Soriano's One Who Wants to Cross, one of The Guardian's Top Ten Best Shows of 2023. Her previous productions include Under the Kundè Tree (Southwark Playhouse), nominated for Lead Performance at the OffWestEnd Awards and for Best Supporting Actor at the Black British Theatre Awards, as well as a rehearsed reading of Facing Mother by Jean-René Lemoine (Park Theatre). As an Associate Producer, Clarisse has also worked on The Great Privation: How to flip two cents into a dollar (Theatre503). Clarisse is a member of the 2023/2024 Orange Tree Theatre’s Writers’ Collective, and one of Stage One’s 2024/2025 Bridge The Gap Producers.

The cast includes Sam Bampoe-Parry as YoungMartha and Shiloh Coke as NowMartha.

Sam Bampoe-Parry trained at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art.  Theatre whilst training includes Home, Welcome to Bettyland, REP and Blurred Lines (LAMDA). 

Shiloh Coke is an actress, composer, musician and writer. Theatre includes Small Island (National Theatre), Misty (Bush Theatre and Trafalgar Studios), Emilia (Shakespeare’s Globe), Julius Caesar, The Tempest and Henry IV (Donmar Warehouse) and Chiaroscuro (Bush Theatre) for which she was also the Composer and Musical Director, and won her a nomination for the Emerging Talent Award at the Evening Standard Theatre Awards.

Film includes 4Q, Pirates, Fast and Furious Presents: Hobbs and Shaw and This Time Next Year. Television includes The Mind of Herbert Clunkerdunk, Ladhood, Cheaters, This Way Up, Jerk and Doctors.

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