Michelle Barnette

My first encounter with Southern Belles - two one-act plays by Tennessee Williams - was actually over a year ago. I wasn't yet working at the King's Head Theatre. Jamie Armitage, the director - and also the director of the smash-hit SIX - and I were working together at another venue and he was telling me about this pretty special play he found, And Tell Sad Stories of the Deaths of Queens.

Southern Belles, uniting two ground-breaking one-act plays by Tennessee Williams, will headline the King's Head Theatre's 2019 Queer Season, running from 24 July to 24 August. Southern Belles is directed by Jamie Armitage, co-director of the multi Olivier nominated musical Six, a graduate of King's Head Theatre's Trainee Resident Director's scheme and now a Junior Associate, as well as a Resident Director at the Almeida Theatre.

Steven Atkinson, Co-Founder and Artistic Director of HighTide, has today announced that the company will present five world premiere productions at this year's Edinburgh Festival Fringe, before transferring them to its Aldeburgh and Walthamstow Festivals, as part of a brand-new mentoring scheme for new playwrights and producers. The launch of the programme marks the company's commitment to creating a bridge that supports new theatre makers starting out on the fringe and is indicative of festival's proven ability in providing a platform for launching professional careers with the UK's leading theatres.

Alistair Toovey (An Octoroon, National Theatre/Orange Tree; The Box of Delights, Wilton's Music Hall; Lord of the Flies, Regents Park Open Air Theatre), Helena Wilson (Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, The Old Vic; The Lady from the Sea, Donmar Warehouse) and Gianbruno Spena (Romeo and Juliet, Custom/Practise; Boy Stroke Girl, Tristan Bates Theatre; Save, Theatre76) will star in the world premiere of Michelle Barnette's Love Me Now at Tristan Bates Theatre.

Alistair Toovey (An Octoroon, National Theatre/Orange Tree; The Box of Delights, Wilton's Music Hall; Lord of the Flies, Regents Park Open Air Theatre), Helena Wilson (Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, The Old Vic; The Lady from the Sea, Donmar Warehouse) and Gianbruno Spena (Romeo and Juliet, Custom/Practise; Boy Stroke Girl, Tristan Bates Theatre; Save, Theatre76) star in the world premiere of Michelle Barnette's Love Me Now at Tristan Bates Theatre.

Alistair Toovey (An Octoroon, National Theatre/Orange Tree; The Box of Delights, Wilton's Music Hall; Lord of the Flies, Regents Park Open Air Theatre), Helena Wilson (Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, The Old Vic; The Lady from the Sea, Donmar Warehouse) and Gianbruno Spena (Romeo and Juliet, Custom/Practise; Boy Stroke Girl, Tristan Bates Theatre; Save, Theatre76) will star in the world premiere of Michelle Barnette's Love Me Now at Tristan Bates Theatre.

This spring, the world premiere of Michelle Barnette's Love Me Now will come to Tristan Bates Theatre. Throwing a sharp light on casual relationships and today's hook-up culture, Love Me Now is about the toxicity of casual dating and the grey area between love and sex, consent and compliance, yes and no.