Nina Wadia And Sara Stewart Lead The Cast Of The UK Première Of COLLECTIVE RAGE: A PLAY IN FIVE BETTIES

Antic Face and Nik Holttum Productions today announce casting for the UK première of award-winning American playwright Jen Silverman's play Collective Rage: A Play in Five Betties. Nina Wadia (Betty 4) and Sara Stewart (Betty 1) lead the all-female company, directed by Charlie Parham, along with Lucy McCormick (Betty 2), Beatriz Romilly (Betty 3) and Genesis Lynea (Betty 5). Collective Rage opens in the Large at Southwark Playhouse on 29 January, with previews from 24 January and runs until 17 February.

COLLECTIVE RAGE: A PLAY IN FIVE BETTIES

*IN ESSENCE, A QUEER AND OCCASIONALLY HAZARDOUS EXPLORATION; DO YOU REMEMBER WHEN YOU WERE IN MIDDLE SCHOOL AND YOU READ ABOUT SHACKLETON AND HOW HE EXPLORED THE ANTARCTIC?; IMAGINE THE ANTARCTIC AS A PUSSY AND IT'S SORT OF LIKE THAT.

Betty is rich; Betty is lonely; Betty's busy working on her truck; Betty wants to talk about love, but Betty needs to hit something. Meanwhile, Betty decides to stage a production of that play-within-a-play from...what's it called again? Summer's Midnight Dream?

In Collective Rage the lives of five very different New York women named Betty collide at the intersection of anger, sex and "theat-ah". As they meet, fall in love, rehearse, revel and rage, they realise that they've been stuck reading the same scripts for far too long. Strongly influenced by cabaret and female drag, this outrageous comedy exquisitely rejects shame and stereotype. It will punch you in the gut, break your heart and then take you dancing.

Jen Silverman's theatre work includes The Moors (Yale Repertory Theatre, Susan Blackburn Smith Award Finalist), The Roommate (Actor's Theatre of Louisville), Phoebe in Winter (Clubbed Thumb), The Dangerous House of Pretty Mbane (InterAct Theatre - Barrymore Award), Collective Rage: A Play in Five Betties (Woolly Mammoth and The Theater @ Boston Court), and All the Road Home (Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park).

Sara Stewart plays Betty 1. London Theatre includes: Dinner With Friends (Park Theatre), Hay Fever (Duke of Yorks ) Enron (West End & Tour), Six Degrees of Separation (Old Vic), The Hour We Knew Nothing Of Each Other and Present Laughter (National Theatre) The Pain and the Itch and Etta Jenks (Royal Court) Proof (Donmar Warehouse) A Month in the Country and Troilus and Cressida (RSC), Outcry (Cheek by Jowl) Temptation (Westminster) A Doll's House (Rose) and The Real World (Soho Poly) Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf (Scotland tour) Contractions (Sheffield Crucible), Jumpy (Theatre Clwyd), Heartbreak House (Chichester Festival), Serious Money (Birmingham Rep), Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (Lyric, Belfast). Television includes: for the BBC Dr Foster, The Night Manager, Quirke, Fresh Meat, New Tricks, NCS Manhunt, Pramface for ITV Rebus, Mr Selfridge, Midsomer Murders, Secret Diary of a Call Girl, Robin Hood, Poirot, Supply and Demand, A Touch of Frost, for C4 A Very Social Secretary, Drop the Dead Donkey. Film includes: Transformers 5, Philomena, The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, The Road to Guantanamo, A c*ckand Bull Story, Batman Begins, Mrs Brown, The Winslow Boy.

Lucy McCormick plays Betty 2. Her debut solo show Triple Threat had sell-out runs at Edinburgh Festival Fringe, Dublin Fringe Festival and Soho Theatre (Winner - Best Performer at Dublin Fringe Festival, Winner - TV Bomb Groundbreaker Award). Other theatre credits include Roller Diner, First Love Is the Revolution (Soho Theatre), Cinderella (Oxford Playhouse), The Naked Truth (UK tour), Dusa, Fish, Stas and Vi (Northern Lights) and As You Like It (Wirksworth Festival). For television, her credits include On Stage: Live From Television Centre and; for film, Uncle David 2. McCormick also co-founded GETINTHEBACKOFTHEVAN, a performance company with whom she has taken work all over the UK and Europe.

Beatriz Romilly plays Betty 3. Recent theatre credits include Much Ado about Nothing, Doctor Faustus, The God Of Soho, Henry VI Parts 1,2,3 (Shakespeare's Globe Theatre), The Duchess Of Malfi (Nottingham Playhouse), A Midsummer Night's Dream (Shakespeare's Globe international tour) French without Tears, The Sacred Flame (ETT), The Rover (Hampton Court Palace), The Three Musketeers and the Princess of Spain (ETT/Traverse Theatre), This Much Is True (Theatre503), Bacchaefull (Dirty Market Theatre) and After Independence, Silver Birch House, Pera Palas (Arcola Theatre). For television, credits include Born With It, Doctors and Green Green Grass; and for film Henna Nights.

Nina Wadia plays Betty 4. Her theatre credits include Tales From Firozsha Baag (National Theatre), Matchbox Theatre (Hampstead Theatre) and The Vagina Monologues (Mark Goucher Ltd). Her work for television includes EastEnders as series regular Zainab Masood (Winner - Best Actress, British Soap Awards), Doctor Who, Skins, Goodness Gracious Me, The Vicar Of Dibley, Perfect World, All About Me, Thin Ice, Murder In Mind, Hetty Feather, Trollied, Square Roots, Citizen Khan, Waking The Dead, Zapped, The Last Dragonslayer and White Teeth; and for film, Bend It Like Beckham, Murder On The Blackpool Express, A Streetcat Named Bob, Offending Angels, Together, Strangeways Here We Come.

Genesis Lynea plays Betty 5. Recent theatre credits include The Bodyguard (Adelphi Theatre), In the Heights (King's Cross Theatre), Jesus Christ Superstar (Regent's Park Open Air Theatre) Bend it Like Beckham (Phoenix Theatre), Legally Blonde (Curve, Leicester), Ode to Leeds (West Yorkshire Playhouse) and The Wild Party (The Other Palace). For television, her work includes 4 O'Clock Club.

Lynea's dance work includes Jessie J's Do it Like a Dude, and Rimmel's Live the London Look, and she choreographed for the first ever Female Boxing Olympic Championship in 2012.

Charlie Parham directs. His credits include School Play (Southwark Playhouse), For Those Who Cry When They Hear the Foxes Scream (Tristan Bates Theatre), Hippolytos (V&A), Two Gentlemen of the Hollow Heart (RADA Festival) Hamlet (National Theatre of Nice), Measure for Measure (America tour, Jackson's Lane), King Lear (Europe tour, Tristan Bates Theatre), As You Like It (Edinburgh Fringe Festival/The Lion and Unicorn), Sophie Scholl (ADC, also adapted), Ivanov, Waiting for Godot, The Priory, Arcadia, True West and DNA (ADC). He is a performer in drag super troupe DENIM (Soho Theatre, Underbelly). His directorial screen debut, Nightstand (Peccadillo Pictures), showed at UK cinemas and festivals worldwide, and his latest short, Full English, is now in post-production. Parham is also part of Soho Theatre Writer's Lab, assisted Creative Director Coky Giedroyc on The Sound of Music Live for ITV and has directed musical galas at the Arts Theatre West End.

Antic Face
Antic Face was founded by Co-Artistic Directors Emma Hall and Charlie Parham. Hippolytos (Victoria & Albert Museum), for which Emma Hall received an Ian Charleson Award nomination, was the company's sell-out debut production. For Those Who Cry When They Hear The Foxes Scream (Tristan Bates Theatre) received an OFFIE Nomination for Most Promising Playwright received critical acclaim and was paired with a highly popular festival of new talent, Second Half, which brought queer and experimental film, music, comedy, readings and discussions to new audiences giving a platform to over 50 emerging creatives. Most recently, the company staged the world première of School Play (Southwark Playhouse) by Alex MacKeith - OFFIE Nominee, Most Promising Playwright - supported by Arts Council England and published by Oberon Books. The play was lauded by critics and audiences alike for its vital and honest portrayal of the education system.

Nik Holttum Productions
Nik Holttum is a freelance producer of visual arts and theatre. He most recently co-produced School Play by Alex McKeith at Southwark Playhouse and This Much by John Fitzpatrick at Soho Theatre. Holttum was also Associate Producer on Bug, Unfaithful and Fool For Love at Found111. In film, Nik has finished post production on Jellyfish, a feature film starring Liv Hill, Sinead Matthews and Cyril Nri. Other film producing projects include Rate Me by Fyzal Boulifa (Illy Prize Best Short at Directors Fortnight Cannes 2015) and Say Nothing by Roland Kennedy (First Prize Directors Choice Rhode Island).

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