ABOUT
HAT IS MAD ATOMIE?
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Mad Atomie Theatre Co. is a burgeoning theatre company based in Stratford-upon-Avon. Our mission is to create innovative and accessible theatre through productions, workshops, and developmental opportunities for professional theatre artists as well as the broader community. With a focus on Shakespeare and his contemporaries, as well as living verse playwrights, we aim to provide opportunities for audiences, theatre makers, and those simply curious about Shakespeare’s language to build both comprehension and confidence with verse drama through experimentation and fun. We believe a relationship with verse drama goes beyond textual comprehension but comes with a sense of participation in and ownership of such works and the legacy of which they are part.
N A MISSION
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We believe theatre belongs to everyone, and that means promoting accessibility and diversity on stage as well as off. As such, we are committed not only to broadening audience reach, but to providing opportunities for artists to create and explore in ways that not only encourage inclusion but actively contribute to conversations about representation in the arts and how artists' unique lived experiences shape the stories we create and consume.
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We know you may be asking, "If theatre is for everyone, why focus on verse and early modern drama?" To that, our response is twofold: 1) we believe everyone deserves access to the cultural capital that comes with familiarity with Shakespeare and his contemporaries; 2) in a world where words are often our strongest weapons, no one should be unarmed, and what better way to learn to wield words than through working with poetry and verse?
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UR TEAM
Say hello to our founders/directors! Both alumni of the Shakespeare Institute at the University of Birmingham, we are a pair of scholar-practitioners whose specialties span from acting and playwriting to queer Shakespeare, adaptation theory, and beyond.
DEVON BURKE
Founder/Artistic Director
A director, playwright, and actor, Devon holds an MA in Shakespeare and Creativity from the Shakespeare Institute and a postgraduate certificate in Applied Shakespeare from the University of Colorado Boulder. Her passions are contemporary verse drama and promoting casting equity, with a special focus on weight diversity.
SARAYA HADDAD
Founding Member/Company Director
Currently in her PhD write-up on Queer Shakespeare at the Shakespeare Institute, from which she also holds an MA in Shakespeare Studies, Saraya is a performer and playwright as well. She produced her one-woman show, Spiked, at Edinburgh Fringe in 2024, using The Tempest to explore the epidemic of spiking and her own personal experience being spiked during undergrad.
Mad Atomie Theatre Company C.I.C. is registered in England and Wales, No. 15979183.