Amy Evans

Vita

American-born writer and performer Amy Evans began her career in theatre ten years ago, developing spoken word pieces in collaboration with a number of Berlin-based artists and musicians. She began writing for the stage full-time following the premiere of her award-winning first play, Achidi J's Final Hours, at the Finborough Theatre in London in 2004. Inspired by the true story of Senegalese immigrant Mareame N'Deye Sarr who died in a confrontation with German police in Aschaffenburg in July 2001, this play was the beginning of a series of pieces dealing with the topics of displacement, alienation and political violence. Amy has since been the recipient of numerous grants and awards, and her work has appeared in several publications, including Velocity: The Best of Apples and Snakes performance poetry anthology (Black Spring Press, 2003); Mythen, Masken, Subjekte: Kritische Weißseinforschung in Deutschland (Unrast, 2005), a multi-disciplinary publication on critical whiteness studies in Germany; and How Long Is Never? (Josef Weinberger, 2007), a collection of short plays written in response to the crisis in Darfur.

ICI-Project

Mining Tension, Forging Emotional Truth: Performing the Legacy of Oury Jalloh
On January 7, 2005, Oury Jalloh, a 34-year-old man from Sierra Leone, allegedly died by self-incineration while bound by his hands and feet to the floor of a Dessau jail. Police authorities declared his death a suicide; his family’s legal counsel cried foul play. The principle points of divergence in these two narratives generate tensions that, while obscuring factual accuracy, have enormous potential to reveal emotional truth. I will mine this potential through the development of a full-length scripted performance piece inspired by conflicting perspectives on the Oury Jalloh case.

Past and Future Productions

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MANY MEN'S WIFE

Many Men’s Wife was commissioned by the Tricycle Theatre in London in September 2006. It premiered at the Tricycle on October 2006, directed by Charlotte Westenra.

Many Men's Wife, by Amy Evans, starts folk-style, with three Sudanese men flirting charmingly in Khartoum with the woman who, smiling, serves them tea. Only when one man alone proves importunate does she suddenly reprove him. She comes from Darfur, where she has already had many husbands, sometimes four or five at a time, taking turns on her, in the towns they were destroying. Her thunderbolt-out-of-the-blue is one of the few dramatic masterstrokes I have encountered in new playwriting this year ... (Alastair Macaulay, Financial Times)

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UNSTONED

UnStoned was commissioned by the National Youth Theatre of London in May 2006. It premiered at Soho Theatre in London in August 2006, directed by Diana Quick and performed by members of the National Youth Theatre.

When the NYT commissioned me to write a play set in the 80s, I decided to tell the story of how 200 kids climbed over the Berlin Wall and fled to the east. I wanted to revisit this time, where fear was balanced by acts of resistance, and remind audiences that it is possible to fight water cannons and police tanks with stones, and win. (Amy Evans, The Guardian)

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THE BIG NICKEL

The Big Nickel was commissioned by the National Youth Theatre of London in May 2005. It premiered at Soho Theatre in August 2005, directed by Ché Walker and performed by members of the National Youth Theatre.

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ACHIDI J'S FINAL HOURS

Achidi J’s Final Hours was joint winner of the Verity Bargate Award in November 2002. It premiered at the Finborough Theatre in London in May 2004 directed by Ché Walker.

In a series of short, brutally fragmented scenes, Evans depicts the fate of a Senegalese immigrant called Isa. She meets Alex, an out-of-work decorator, tentatively shacks up with him and eventually bears his child. But, excluded from his social and familial life by her race and existing in a xenophobic urban climate, Isa leaves him to live with a Senegalese female activist. Alex's claim to the child, reinforced by police brutality, precipitates the climactic disaster. (Michael Billington, The Guardian)

An unmissable play which portrays the chilling reality faced by many Third World immigrants to Western Europe. (Glen Baker, Morning Star)

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COMMISSIONS IN PROGRESS

• Dumbfounded Theatre Company, London: a new play inspired by the life of Nina Simone.
• The Opera Group, London: an opera libretto inspired by Pim Fortuyn and the politics of Islamophobia and (in)tolerance in Europe.
• The Tricycle Theatre, London: TBA