Fin Kennedy is to leave Tamasha Theatre Company where he has been artistic director since 2015 and co-artistic director prior to that.
A champion of emerging theatre writing talent and an award-winning playwright himself, Kennedy has resisted producing his own work, instead focusing on Tamasha Playwrights.
The writer-led collective nurtures playwrights from diverse cultural backgrounds helping to launch work by writers of colour into the mainstream. Tamasha Playwrights include Tuyen Do, whose Summer Rolls was seen at Bristol Old Vic and London's Park Theatre in 2019, Asif Khan, writer of Combustion seen at London's Arcola Theatre, and Iman Qureshi, whose credits include the Papatango New Writing Prize-winning The Funeral Director.
Ahead of this programme, and as a Tamasha associate artist, Kennedy created Schoolwrights, the UK’s first playwrights-in-schools training scheme, and he has continued to work on a range of notable community, education and training projects.
Kennedy said, “it’s a wrench to move on from such a much-loved company and its close-knit community of awesome and inspiring artists. I joined Tamasha to be an enabler behind the scenes, training and launching a new generation, much as I had done in inner city schools. I was a producer, dramaturg and fundraiser, creating the circumstances for others to shine, for example, through multi-artist projects like Hear Me Now. I committed not to produce my own work, or direct Tamasha's shows, something I've stuck to.
"However, our world is changing fast, and today, more than ever, there is an onus on those in positions of influence to check their privilege. In the past year, Tamasha's board and I have been having a really positive and honest conversation, and we're agreed that the time is right for a handover. I’m very proud of everything Tamasha and I have achieved together, and the company will always have a special place in my heart. But mostly I’m proud of the scores of new storytellers we've launched, and all that they're achieving.
"Who gets to tell their stories really matters, and I swell with pride every time I hear a Tamasha artist’s name discussed, see it on a flyer, or read it in a review. Tamasha is such an important portal into the industry, never more so than now."