Cultivate Workshop Series - The October Playwriting Masterclasses

In celebration of this landmark year, New Earth Theatre is offering the Cultivate Workshop Series as a fundraiser for our 30th Anniversary campaign. Taking place from August to December, there will be new workshops on offer every month. For October, we are offering:

The October Playwriting Masterclasses

A series of four online masterclasses led by different ESEA playwrights who are exploring various aspects of making theatre inspired by historical events and figures. There will be a focus on ESEA history and erased, marginalised or "forgotten" stories. The workshops will include playwrights discussing their approach to dramatising historical material, writing/practical exercises and time for a Q&A.

Where Fact Meets Fiction with Amy Ng

Thursday 2 October, 7-9pm

How do we take historical events and use them to create original stories and drama? How much artistic licence do we have as theatre makers when dealing with real people and events?

Making Theatre From Local Histories with Jude Christian

Thursday 9 October, 7-9pm

Drawing on the experience of the "Liverpool Sailors" project Jude Christian is currently working on with New Earth Theatre and her previous work "Ten Thousand Hearbeats", this session will focus specifically on this aspect of British Chinese history and theatre as an archive for forgotten stories and legacy.

Acts of Rememberance and Social Justice with Daniel York Loh

Saturday 11th October, 10am-12pm

How theatre can be used to tell the stories of people who have been forgotten, marginalised or erased by mainstream history? How can making a play become not only an act of remembrance but a form of social justice?

Personal / Political with Joanne Lau

Tuesday 14th October, 7-9pm

How we might approach writing plays where our own personal history connects with wider history? When does the personal become political and vice versa? In the context of Lau's WORTH.

The October Playwriting Masterclasses are part of the Cultivate Workshop Series, brought to you by New Earth Theatre as a fundraiser for its 30th Anniversary Campaign. More workshops will be added regularly so be sure to check out what's on offer. All workshops are £15, plus the Eventbrite service charge of £1.63. If you wish to attend all four workshops in this series, there is a special price of £50, plus £4.07 service charge.

As this is a fundraiser, if you are able to, we ask that you consider donating more on top of the £16.63 class fee and service charge.

Meet the facilitators:

Amy Ng

Amy Ng is a British-Hong Kong playwright, screenwriter and historian. She frequently draws inspiration from history and contemporary issues in her work, but she prefers starting with an open question rather than an agenda.

Amy's plays include SHANGHAI DOLLS (Kiln Theatre, London), UNDER THE UMBRELLA (Belgrade Theatre Coventry, UK Tour), ACCEPTANCE (Hampstead Theatre, London) and SHANGRI-LA (Finborough Theatre, London). Radio plays include TIGER GIRLS (BBC Radio 4) and KILBURN PASSION (BBC Radio 3). She is under commission to the National Theatre and the Almeida Theatre in London. Amy also writes for the screen. She was included on the BBC’s New Talent Hotlist in 2017, and named as one of the Broadcast Hotshots in 2022.

Amy trained as a historian with a research interest in multinational empires, imperial decline, and nationality conflict, and is the author of Nationalism and Political Liberty (Oxford University Press). She is fluent in English, German and Chinese and regularly translates contemporary Chinese plays into English.

Jude Christian

Jude Christian's writing includes The Snow Queen (Polka), Ways of Being (Tramway, Sadler’s Wells), LADY (Yomiuri Otemachi Hall Tokyo), Ten Thousand Heartbeats (Tamasha, Coney, Liverpool Unity and Everyman), Hamlet adapted for young audiences (National Theatre), A Manual for Grieving (Chinese Arts Now), Dick Whittington (Lyric and National Theatre), Nanjing (The Yard, Shakespeare’s Globe, 2021 Theatertreffen Stückemarkt), Cinderella (Lyric).

Daniel York Loh

Daniel York Loh’s full-length plays include The Fu Manchu Complex (Ovalhouse/Moongate), Forgotten 遗忘. (Arcola/Plymouth Theatre Royal/Moongate/New Earth) based on the experiences of the World War One Chinese Labour Corps, and The Dao of Unrepresentative British Chinese Experience) (Soho Theatre/Kakilang – off West End award nominated), as well as for the Royal Court’s Living Newspaper and Living Archive, Silent Disco in the Sky (Northern Stage ‘Scroll’ collection). He is one of 21 ‘writers of colour’ featured in the best-selling essay collection The Good Immigrant. With An-Ting 安婷 he co-created and performed in every dollar is a soldier/with money you’re a dragon, which juxtaposed the histories of the wealthy Astor family and the first Chinese immigrants in London, and which won the 2022 Arts Council Digital Culture Award (Storytelling). For Papergang he wrote Invisible Harmony无形的和谐 (Southbank Centre/2020 CAN Festival) based on the June 4th Tiananmen massacre and the history of East/Southeast Asian protest and activism. With composer Craig Adams he won 2014 Perfect Pitch to create an original musical for Sinking Water, based on the 2004 Morecambe Bay tragedy. His plays for drama schools include Asian Exclusion Act based on the history of Anti-Asian racism.

Joanne Lau

Joanne Lau is a writer for screen, stage, and radio. An alumna of the BBC Writersroom Comedy Room and the BBC New Talent Hotlist, she has been a finalist for the BAFTA Rocliffe New Writing Forum for TV Drama and the Royal Court Theatre/Kudos Writing Fellowship. Her play WORTH with New Earth Theatre was staged at Arcola Theatre, Storyhouse, and published by Methuen Drama. Her play100 Books to Read Before You Die was staged by the MA Contemporary Acting programme at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama. Joanne's short plays have appeared at Omnibus Theatre, Embassy Theatre, and been published in the Routledge Anthology of Short Plays with Great Roles for Women.