Jefny Ashcroft: Drama Specialist

About me

I specialise in plays which are site specific, written especially for the place where they are performed. I write plays both for adults and for children.

In a recent example, I was commissioned to write two plays for the opening of the newly restored Billiard Room at Bantock House Museum. Civic Pride, set in the 1890s, is a play for adults which features a gathering of the captains of industry from Victorian Wolverhampton. The Man from the Works, for school visits, features the bitter tinplate workers strike of 1850.

Civic Pride is a promenade performance, so the audiences moved around the museum, visiting the beautiful drawing room, lobby and broad stairs of the museum - the former home of Baldwin Bantock, who appeared as a character in both the plays.

I believe in presenting theatre as informally as possible. So my work is often promenade in style, with the audience following the action around the building as it is staged.

Bringing history to life is one of my specialisms.

I can write for a specific audience, such as different age groups of children or teenagers; or elderly adults. I can also produce work which meets the curriculum needs of a specific Key Stage.

I also write for a wider adult audience.

I have research experience and qualifications in history, including a Ph.D. from Birmingham University in the history of the Black Country. I am able to use this to take on briefs for writing plays which use historical buildings, including schools, writing about people who lived there and the events they experienced.

I am a qualified teacher, with experience of working with primary and secondary pupils, and with F.E. students, including adults.

Click here for a listing of my plays which have been performed.




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