March 2024

Evolution Festival will return to the Lyric Hammersmith in March 2024 for its eighth year, providing a platform and career launchpad for young theatre makers producing innovative work for stage and screen.

A Lyric Hammersmith: Evolution Festival (Labs) production in partnership with BA Theatre Design at UAL: Wimbledon College of Arts.

Artists from previous years have gone on to create shows at the Lyric, Royal Court Theatre, the Vaults, Bunker Theatre, Battersea Arts Centre, Sheffield Theatres, and the Young Vic.

Evolution: Labs was set up in 2016 by Young Lyric and the BA Theatre Design course at UAL: Wimbledon College of Arts as a much-needed collaborative opportunity for early career directors and designers to meet and co-create work. This year Jordi M. Carter, Prashant Tailor, Matilda Liu and Segen Yosife will each direct re-lensed classic plays, respectively: The Government Inspector, The Birds, Mine Eyes Have Seen, and Candida. These re-workings are co-created with final year BA Theatre Design students from Wimbledon College of Arts; Leonah Alexander-Joseph, Amelia Kyriacou, Junru Chen and Dahye Kim.

Cast

Khaya Williams (Khlestakov) — Dami Adeyeye
Amara Jones (Osip) — Jessica Enemokwu
The Mayor — Phoebe Cleghorn
The Judge (Lyapkin-Tyapkin) — Agnes V. Moricz

Creative Team

Writer — David Harrower, after Nikolai Gogol
Director & Adapted by — Jordi M. Carter
Set & Costume Designer — Leonah Alexander-Joseph
Lighting Designer — Carey Chomsoonthorn
Producer — Annys Whyatt

With thanks to Rob Lehmann, Adrian Gardner, Lucy Algar, Glen Neath, Paula Rivas, Freddie Lippi, and the Production Teams at the Lyric Hammersmith and UAL: Wimbledon College of Arts.