Casting announced for Agatha at The Pleasance Downstairs

Casting has been announced for Agatha at The Pleasance Downstairs.

A new production fusing original music, spoken word and personal experience, Agatha was originally due to run as part of VAULT Festival 2022.

Agatha has been rehomed to Pleasance Downstairs this Spring, playing from 1 – 5 March.

West End theatre, film and TV star Olivia Carruthers (Life, BBC; Life After George, Duchess Theatre; Four Weddings and a Funeral, MGM TV) will play Agatha alongside Suzanna Hamilton (Nineteen Eighty-Four, Virgin Films; EastEnders, BBC; The Strike, BBC) as Rose, and award winning writer and actor Gemma Barnett (Goggles, ThisEgg; A Hundred Words for Snow, Trafalgar Studios; Dr Korczak’s Example, Leeds Playhouse) as Jo.

Agatha will be directed by Martha Geelan (The Shark is Broken, Ambassadors Theatre; Fiddler on the Roof, The Playhouse Theatre; Indecent, Menier Chocolate Factory).

Jo has a decision to make. Stuck in the car, she needs someone to tell her what to do; what she wants; why she’s here. Agatha is dead and living her dream life running a blues bar in the afterlife. Set across three generations of women in the same family, this moving production portrays the spikiness of mother-daughter relationships and the most intense love that can be intertwined amongst the thorns.

Based on real life events, Agatha tells an intergenerational story of women battling lost dreams, coping mechanisms and each other. Writer and performer Gemma Barnett draws on her own family relationships with incredible honesty to present this production.

Composer Katy Hustwick (This Beautiful Future, Jermyn St Theatre; HOLE, Jermyn St Theatre) cleverly fuses music with spoken word and dialogue to underscore the beat of Agatha, while Lucy Adams (Ordinary Miracle, National Youth Theatre; dressed., ThisEgg; Art Heist, Underbelly/New Diorama) also brings her talents as Lighting Designer.

Tickets are available online now from pleasance.co.uk

Director Martha Geelan said: “What strikes me most about this extraordinary piece that Gemma has written, is how deeply it speaks to the complexities of female identity. The trauma, love and expectation that women pass down through generations – it shapes who we are and what we feel we are supposed to want. How do we know how we are making the right decisions? Who do we base our choices on? How do we learn to be the best versions of ourselves?”