Maiden Speech Festival Returns For A Second Season

Maiden Speech is a dynamic and exciting theatre festival staging brand new work by emerging theatremakers. Now in its second year, Maiden Speech returns with 16 new shows, championing new work that engages with themes of gender, sexuality, and identity through a myriad of stories and styles. The 2018 season will bring together more than 40 emerging creatives for a two-week run, from the 27th of November to the 8th of December at the Tristan Bates Theatre in Covent Garden.

Producer Lexi Clare says, "Maiden Speech emerged from a desire to promote positive change within the theatre industry and to give life to exciting new work being developed by emerging artists. Maiden Speech was named to reflect the festival's emphasis on new work and change-making agenda, but also to honour the late Jo Cox, whose life and legacy has had an enormous impact on my resolve to actively become an agent of change."

In 2018, the festival will present drag performance and dark comedy, cabaret and spoken word, solo shows and so much more. Maiden Speech is committed to challenging the representation of women in theatre, with an entirely female-identifying production team and 87% of the programme created by female-identifying artists. The production team is also entirely comprised of theatre-makers who identify as LGBT+. This year, Maiden Speech are using their platform to raise funds for Stonewall, an organisation that campaigns for the equality of lesbian, gay, bi and trans people across Britain.

Programme highlights include Kayla Feldman's Hear Me Out, a spoken word show interrogating bodily autonomy and concepts of womanhood, and Wallis Hamilton Felton's Dirty Laundry that weaves together storytelling and Irish folk music in a haunting new solo piece about the Magdalene Laundries.

In Sarah Wanendeya's Becoming The Invisible Woman, a woman 'awakens' to find herself middle-aged, stuck in a rut, and confused, whilst in Rachel Causer's When It Happens, three women rebel against self-doubt, micro-aggressions, and the roles they've been forced to play for far too long.

Lucy Park's The List is a delicate and fascinating performance offering a non-Western perspective on the #MeToo movement through traditional Korean music and dance, and Georgina Armfield's Lover, Whore or Handmaiden? is a vibrant reimagining of the classical canon that places iconic female characters centre stage.

Me, Mum & The Patriarchy is an autobiographical solo by Keeley Lane about three generations of Northern women and the irony of choice, and Ashleigh Laurence's Tumours is a darkly funny solo about a woman struggling with a premonition of death. In Hero Win, Anna North battles an addiction (to puns) and navigates the stress of fighting a habit, whilst Annie Cheung teeters dangerously between comedy and tragedy as she recounts her relationship with high-functioning depression in DOTS.

In Minor Disruptions, Katie Paterson combines comedy, performance art, and storytelling to explore the contradictions of childhood, whilst the 'bitch' stereotype is thoroughly dismantled by Emma Hough's neo-burlesque cabaret The Bitch Manifesto and Alexandra Christle's drag show Crystal Bollix presents The Bitch Ball.

Religion and sexuality collide in Mark McCredie's The Revelation Of A Sad Christian Boy, as Jack Donald's A Sticky Season charts the journey of two controversial queer lives through a language of jazz and poetry. Written in verse, Roxane Bourges' Sincerely, Jodie recounts the downfall of an aimless young woman, stuck in a sexist work environment, whose admiration for a male celebrity turns dangerous.

Maiden Speech will be accompanied by a series of panel events that aim to encourage greater discussion surrounding challenges facing theatremakers today. Events include 'Exploring Sexual Assault On Stage' on Thursday 29 November, with panel guests Alissa Anne Jeun Yi (Love Songs) and Abi Zakarian (Fabric).

Maiden Speech continues its commitment to nurturing the next generation of emerging theatre makers, working with the National Youth Arts Trust to offer complimentary tickets and practical workshops to young people from non-privileged backgrounds.

Joel Fisher, Creative Producer of the Actors Centre adds, "We are delighted to be able to host the Maiden Speech Festival in its second year, as we continue to promote artists who dare to create their own work. The intent behind the festival is inspiring, and I'm confident that many of these shows will go on to have a substantial life beyond this run."

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