tiata fahodzi Announces New Season, Including Nkenna Akunna's CHEEKY LITTLE BROWN

tiata fahodzi, the UK’s leading British African heritage contemporary theatre company, today announces a new season of theatre including a major tour of a new production; welcomes a new wave of six artists and creative associates to the tiata fahodzi family; and commissions a new Triple Bill of explosive short plays showcasing theatre’s most exciting new voices, all slated for autumn 2023/Spring 2024.

Under the leadership of Artistic Director Chinonyerem Odimba, tiata fahodzi returns to major touring in autumn 2023 with Papatango award-winning playwright and performer Nkenna Akunna’s Cheeky Little Brown. The production will tour to Belgrade Theatre, Coventry, as well as Manchester’s The Lowry and Derby Theatre, with more venues to be announced.

Cheeky Little Brown is a coming-of-age story, part drama, part musical which will have its European Premiere this September at Bristol Old Vic (co-producing partner together with the Belgrade Theatre).

Continuing its 25th anniversary commitment to investing in the future of British African heritage artists tiata fahodzi invites six outstanding new artists to make the organisation their home. This year’s new tf PlayLabcohort include Creative Associates Sherrie Eugene-Hart an award-winning broadcaster, academic and leading sign-language interpreter; Mugabe, My Dad and Me’s playwright and multi-hypenate Tonderai Munyevu and returning dramaturg ZODWA NYONI. The three new Artist Associates are spoken word maestro and writer Steve Otieno-Mangero (aka Magero); actor, director, facilitator and poet Ewa Dina and award-winning J’Ouvert’s leading actor Sapphire Joy. These artists will benefit from tiata fahodzi’s partnership with some of the theatres that have become home for the organisation, opening up opportunities for them to engage with those buildings in new ways. In addition Sofia Stephanou, previously at Paines Plough, has joined the team as tiata fahodzi’s Executive Producer.

Following on from the success of last year’s Talking About A Revolution, a back-to-back Triple Bill of explosive short plays by Diana Atouna, Babirye Bukilwa and Malaika Kegode, tiata fahodzi will commission exciting new voices to launch a 2024 Triple Bill, complete with the new provocation with the title “Everywhere”. The shows will be directed by Chinonyerem Odimba, and will tour to reimagined theatre spaces, inviting conversations around the meaning of home.

Meanwhile, tf Summer’s postponed Laugh It Off, a comedy writing initiative announced last year focusing on tiata fahodzi’s commitment to nurturing the next generation of Black British and British-African heritage comedy writers in partnership with Theatre Centre, finally launches this August.

Commenting on the new season of work and its overarching theme, Artistic Director Chinonyerem Odimba says: “Coming Home is a brand-new season of theatre and projects that tells the stories of what we are, and what we are becoming. Telling stories about of all our tomorrows. tf ‘Coming Home’ is an invitation to artists, audiences, and communities to find the places in our art, in our work, and in theatre that feel like home. Whether that is through joy or grief, through words or physically, everyone deserves a sense of home - a place where we can be our truest self. We will interrogate what it is to have a home, and what it takes to create new spaces to grow in. We will put stories by artists in their deserved spaces, and with a new cohort of Artist Associates and Creative Associates we continue to build spaces where artists and meet, talk and pause together.”

Photo Details: Top row: Ewa Dina, Magero, Sapphire Joy. Bottom row: ZODWA NYONI, Tonderai Munyevu, Sherrie-Eugene Hart