Actors Touring Company (ATC) partners again with the Greenwich+Docklands International Festival 2024 (GDIF) to present Bodies of Water, a powerful new site-specific show staged on the banks of the Thames in the Royal Borough of Greenwich, exploring the deeply moving stories of people travelling across land and water to seek refuge. Often portrayed as the voiceless subjects of divisive political debate, this World Premiere, starring Laila Alj, co-created with 30 people from the sanctuary seeking community, shines a much-needed light on their invisibility in UK society.
Bodies of Water takes place from the 27 to 31 August, a total of 7 performances across 5 days, at the Ahoy! Centre in Deptford, Greenwich. This show responds to renowned poet Warsan Shire’s (Lemonade and Black is King with Beyoncé) striking poem HOME.
Conceived by ATC’s Artistic Director Matthew Xia – fresh from directing his 5* production Skeleton Crew at the Donmar Warehouse – this production is a collaboration with renowned dramaturg and community facilitator Francesca Beard and Britain’s most celebrated Oud player, Rihab Azar.
Described by Arts Council England as an artist with ‘exceptional promise’, Azar will be playing originally composed live music. Laila Alj will perform in the role of narrator alongside a group of 30 local people who have had first-hand experience of the asylum system. Facilitated by Francesca Beard, their testimonies of leaving, journeying and arriving have been turned into poetic vignettes, creating an evocative and authentic dimension to this piece of community theatre in its truest sense.
In addition, the show will also feature a community choir led by Stratford East Singers’ choir leader Byron Gold.
This production feels more urgent than ever – as of 2020, there were over 130,000 refugees living in the UK with a significant portion having arrived via dangerous sea routes, seeking safety and sanctuary (REF: Refugee Council) (see further statistics in the Notes to Editors below).
This brand-new production marks the third collaboration between ATC and GDIF following 2023’s sell-out, critically acclaimed production The Architect, which honoured the 30th anniversary of Stephen’s Lawrence’s death and saw the production nominated for Producer of the Year and the Innovation Award at this year’s The Stage Awards.
Olivier Award-winning director Matthew Xia, Artistic Director of Actors Touring Company (ATC) says: “Warsan Shire’s visceral poem HOME has become a clarion for people seeking refuge. Bodies of Water invites those who have – for too long – been spoken about, spoken over, silenced and used as culture war fodder to respond in their own words. This new show places ownership of this experience back with those who have lived it, an artistic act of resistance, a public record which challenges and combats the dominant narrative. Let’s listen to the humans not the headlines.”
Francesca Beard, dramaturg adds: “Bodies of Water challenges the skewed narrative of migration by placing real people with lived experience as the story-teller rather than the offstage threat. Each performance will be different and unique, just like each human life experience. We hope audiences leave feeling energised and uplifted.”
Bradley Hemmings, the Artistic Director of the Greenwich+Docklands International Festival, co-commissioner and co-producer of Bodies of Water says: “I know that audiences are in for a deeply affecting experience at Bodies of Water this summer. It’s an honour to be working with ATC and participants with lived experience of migration, on this timely new production, presented against an epic Thames landscape as the tide ebbs and flows. GDIF 2024’s theme is “All Change” and this production will exemplify the way in which outdoor theatre can give urgency to global and local stories, awakening our capacity for empathy and transforming our perceptions.”
Bodies of Water is supported by Esmée Fairbairn Foundation, John Ellerman Foundation, Stanley Thomas Johnson Foundation and Wates Foundation. ATC is an Arts Council England National Portfolio Organisation.
