Cast + Tour Announced For Clean Break / Theatr Clwyd's THICK AS THIEVES By Katherine Chandler

Polly Frame and Siwan Morris have been cast in the roles of Gail and Karen in Thick as Thieves, a new play from Wales Drama Award winning playwright Katherine Chandler.

Directed by Róisín McBrinn, Joint Artistic Director of Clean Break, Thick as Thieves is the first ever co-production between Theatr Clwyd and Clean Break. Following its première at Theatr Clwyd, the production tours to Salisbury Playhouse and Hull Truck Theatre. The main theatrical tour will be followed by visits to three women's prisons across the country, accompanied by workshops enabling prison audiences to further explore the issues discussed in the play.

This tense, revealing play explores what it means to care for one another and asks who, in a time of increasing disconnect, we expect to look after us.

Two women from very different worlds: Karen has built a picture-perfect life while Gail struggles to keep hers together. When Gail re-enters Karen's life from out of the blue she brings with her everything Karen has been running from.

Clean Break changes lives and changes minds through theatre - on stage, in prison and in the community. Founded in 1979 by two women prisoners, the acclaimed theatre company has recently unveiled a new three-women leadership team. Joint Artistic Directors Róisín McBrinn and Anna Herrmann, and Executive Director Erin Gavaghan will lead the company into an exciting 40th anniversary year in 2019 and beyond.

Theatr Clwyd is the largest producing theatre in Wales - a theatrical powerhouse with a rich history of homegrown productions over more than 4 decades. Now, led by the Executive team of Tamara Harvey and Liam Evans-Ford, it is going from strength to strength producing world class theatre, from new plays to classic revivals, and creating life changing work with, for and by its community.

Clean Break changes lives and changes minds through theatre - on stage, in prison and in the community. It produces ground-breaking plays with women writers and actors at the heart of its work. Founded in 1979 by two women prisoners who believed that theatre could bring the hidden stories of imprisoned women to a wider audience, it is still the only theatre company of its kind remaining true to these roots; inspiring playwrights and captivating audiences with the company's award winning plays on the complex theme of women and crime.

Its commissioned playwrights have included Zawe Ashton, Alice Birch, Deborah Bruce, Lin Coghlan, E V Crowe, Vivienne Franzmann, Tanika Gupta, Katie Hims, Sam Holcroft, Theresa Ikoko, Lucy Kirkwood, Chloë Moss, Rebecca Lenkiewicz, Winsome Pinnock and Rebecca Prichard.

Recent success for the company has included receiving a Tonic Award for its dedication to changing women's lives through theatre and commitment to new writing. As well as co-producing and touring Thick as Thieves, activity during 2018 has included Alice Birch's [BLANK] - a co-commission with National Theatre Connections (which was performed by young people around the UK and at the National Theatre); participating in Artichoke's Processions project; and Belong, created by a group of young women with Natasha Marshall, Clean Break's Channel 4 Playwright In Residence and winner of a Most Promising New Playwright Offie for Half Breed.

Theatr Clwyd is the largest producing theatre in Wales - a beacon of excellence looking across the Clwydian Hills yet only forty minutes from Liverpool. Since 1976 it has been a theatrical powerhouse and much-loved home for its community. Now, led by the Executive team of Tamara Harvey and Liam Evans-Ford, it is going from strength to strength producing world class theatre, from new plays to classic revivals, supported by an in-house team of workshop, wardrobe, scenic artists, props maker, and lighting and sound technicians. Its recent co-production of Home, I'm Darling with the National Theatre opened in Wales to great acclaim before going on to a sold out run in London. There are three theatre spaces, a cinema, café, bar and art galleries and, alongside its own shows, it offers a rich and varied programme of visual arts, film, theatre, music, dance and comedy.

Theatr Clwyd works extensively with the community within its building and across North Wales. Alongside weekly companies of cross-generational theatre groups, it has also been recognised for its work in youth justice, its varied programme of arts, health and wellbeing, and for its growing raft of projects integrating its community in making the work on its stages and beyond.

Katherine Chandler's theatre credits include Bird (Royal Exchange Theatre/Sherman Theatre), Parallel Lines - winner of Wales Drama Award (Dirty Protest Theatre/Chapter Arts), Before it Rains (Sherman Theatre/Bristol Old Vic), Hood (National Theatre), Buddy (Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama/The Gate), The Silly Kings, Peggy's Song (National Theatre Wales), The Princess and the Pea, The Ugly Duckling (Sherman Theatre), Spent (Clean Break), and Leaves on a Line (Royal Court/Dirty Protest Theatre).

Róisín McBrinn is an award-winning theatre director. She is Joint Artistic Director at Clean Break theatre company and her credits for the company include Joanne (Soho Theatre/RSC) and House/Amongst the Reeds (Yard Theatre). Other credits include the stage adaptation of Roddy Doyle's The Snapper (Gate Theatre, Dublin), Noveccento (Donmar Warehouse), Afterplay (Sheffield Theatres), Yerma (West Yorkshire Playhouse), Discurso (Prime Cut Villa), No Escape, Perve, Heartbreak House (The Abbey Theatre), Before it Rains, Sleeping Beauties and It's A Family Affair (Sherman Theatre).

Polly Frame's theatre credits include: On The Exhale (Traverse, Fringe First Winner), Jekyll and Hyde (English Touring Consortium), A Short History Of Tractors In Ukranian (Hull Truck), Frankenstein, Hedda Gabler (Northern Stage), Henry V (Regent's Park Open Air Theatre), The Odyssey (English Touring Theatre), Mermaid (Shared Experience), Arcadia (Tobacco Factory), Twelfth Night (Filter Theatre), Pastoral (Soho Theatre), After Miss Julie (Young Vic), The Crossing as part of 66 Books (Bush Theatre), The Comedy Of Errors (Stafford Shakespeare Festival), Earthquakes in London (National Theatre), The Count of Monte Cristo (West Yorkshire Playhouse), Macbeth (Chichester, West End, Broadway), Home-Work (Bodies in Flight for Singapore Esplanade), A Response to Twelfth Night (Filter), The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, Poor Mrs Pepys (New Vic), ACDC (Royal Court), Cleansed (Arcola). Television includes: Doctors, Casualty, Man Down, The Tunnel, Coronation Street, Holby City, The Curse of the Hope Diamond, Silent Witness, EastEnders, Bunny Town, Sea of Souls, Accused, Life Begins, New Tricks, Meet the Magoons, The Giblets, Servants. Film includes: Macbeth, Half Light, Duplicity.

Siwan Morris's theatre credits includes: Highway One (Wales Millennium Centre), Dublin Carol (Sherman Cymru), Bird (Royal Exchange/Sherman Cymru), Violence and Son, Gas Station Angel (Royal Court Theatre), Tonypandemonium, A Good Night Out in the Valleys (National Theatre Wales), Cloakroom (Sherman Cymru), Knives in Hens (Theatre Royal, Bath), A Midsummer Night's Dream, Suddenly Last Summer, The Rabbit, King Lear, Flora's War, Hosts of Rebecca, The Journey Of Mary Kelly, Rape of the Fair Country, Equus (Theatr Clywd), The Seagull (Bristol Old Vic), Much Ado About Nothing, Twelfth Night (UK tour), The Merchant of Venice, The Winter's Tale (Ludlow Festival). Television includes: Gwaith/Cartref, Y Streica Fi, Doctor Who, Our Girl, Wolfblood, Holby City, Whites, Caerdydd, Con Passionate, Miss Marple, Skins, Antigone, Mine All Mine,
20 Things To Do Before You're 30, Belonging, Social Action, The Bill, Casualty, Mind To Kill, The Bench, Tales of the Pleasure Beach. Film includes: Dark Signal, The Devil's Vice, The Machine. Sister Lulu, sucker fish, The Marvellous Handshake.

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