Midlands-born performers Alexia McIntosh and Kieran Hamilton-Amos will join Belgrade Theatre creative director Corey Campbell in Big Aunty, directed and devised by Campbell, which will be the first home-produced show of the Belgrade’s spring season.
McIntosh appeared in the Toby Marlow and Lucy Moss musical Six in the West End and on its UK tour while Hamilton-Amos took the lead in Casey Bailey’s Grimeboy at Birmingham Rep in 2022.
Big Aunty is a “darkly comic family drama” that is “alive with ideas and emotions that connect us all, offering a welcome opportunity to gather and reflect on challenging times and how we can find a path to resolution”.
Campbell explained, “as a devising artist, I often use theatre to help express who I am. But right now I see so many people in the same place as me. A lot of us have experienced loss over the past couple of years—it feels like the whole country is mourning.
“I hope Big Aunty will give all of us an opportunity to come together and share the experience in the unique way only theatre can provide—to laugh and cry, to heal and forgive.”
Sarah Githugu is assistant director, Claire Winfield is set designer, Joe Hornsby is lighting designer and Auden Allan is sound designer. Casting director is Emma Barber. Joelle Ikwa is the community producer and choir leader.
Big Aunty, which will feature a seven-person ensemble choir drawn from the local community, will run in the Belgrade’s B2 auditorium from Monday 24 April until Saturday 6 May.