What are the themes of your play?
boxes is a poetic psychological foray into the destructive nature of transitional homelessness. It explores charity, friendship, violence, femininity, sexuality, body image, custard creams, red wine and the power of pounded yam.
Why did you write it and why now?
The soon fossilised caricature villains, who have stumbled into the responsibility of running this country, would describe the experiences of the protagonist in boxes as a “lifestyle choice”. The divisive performativity of those words do exactly what they were intended to do: feed into the frenzied polarisation of society, and personally, boil my blood. Despite that, I don’t write for the people who are incapable of seeing the humanity in a person like me. I write for the marginalised. I write for the intersectionality of my Womanhood, my Blackness, my Queerness, my Working-class-ness. Why not now? Lived experience is an authentic experience, a non-monolithic one, a three-dimensional one. It is imperative that we gloriously take up space and share the nuanced variations of our lives.
Which playwrights are you influenced by and in what way?
debbie tucker green. Sarah Kane. Ntozake Shange. Brilliantly anarchic writers who subvert form and indulge in the elasticity of language.
What do you want to achieve as a playwright?
From pen to pages to pdfs, writing has always been a very private and cathartic outlet for me, with notebooks and the notes app bursting full of half baked ramblings, but I think I’m ready to share… a little! I want to make people laugh, think a little deeper, interrogate themselves and those around them. Hopefully, and gratefully taking up space on a stage, or two, or a few… and maybe a few more…and.