Queer Theatre Reveals Upcoming Queer Play Reading Club guests

Queer Theatre will return this year with its newly announced award-winning guest playwrights for its monthly Queer Play Reading Club, delivered in partnership with Nick Hern Books.  Plays from Chris Bush, Marcelo Dos Santos and Caroline Bird will be read, discussed and contextualised in exciting Q&As with the playwrights.

Taking place at The Railway, a queer-run pub in Clapham, Queer Play Reading Club offers a supportive, low-pressure, social space to celebrate LGBTQIA+ playwriting. Each session includes an open opportunity for writers to bring short scenes or monologues to be read by members of the group, followed by constructive feedback. This is followed by a group reading of a full-length published play, with a relaxed discussion and a Q&A with the playwright, facilitated by Queer Theatre’s Artistic Director Andrew Keates.

The season launches on Tuesday 20th January with Otherland by Olivier award-winner Chris Bush (Standing at the Sky’s Edge, National Theatre/Sheffield Theatres/West End; Fantastically Great Women Who Changed the World, London/UK Tour/Edinburgh Fringe). Otherland is a bold, tender exploration of becoming and of telling the truth about who you are when everything is changing. As Jo and Harry navigate a break up, new worlds open up, full of new partners, new identities and new possibilities. What kind of women do they want to be and do they have the courage, or the permission, to get there? The play premiered at the Almeida Theatre in 2025 and was a finalist for the 2025 Susan Smith Blackburn Prize.   

Next up on Tuesday 24th February is the critically acclaimed play, Feeling Afraid As If Something Terrible Is Going To Happen by The Scotsman’s Fringe First award-winner Marcelo Dos Santos (Backstairs Billy, West End; Subverts, Royal Court Theatre). When a permanently single, neurotic standup comedian meets Mr Right, everything ends up going wrong. Dark and bitingly funny, this one-person play is a vulnerable exploration of intimacy, ego and honesty. It premiered at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 2022 and transferred to the Bush Theatre in 2023.

Rounding off the first announced play readings is The Last Stand of Mrs Mary Whitehouse by critically acclaimed Caroline Bird (RED ELLEN, UK Tour; The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, Northern Stage) on Tuesday 17th March. Bird’s wickedly funny play transports audiences back to the 1970s as Mary Whitehouse becomes one of the most influential figures in Britain’s culture wars.  It examines censorship, morality and the political power of outrage through Whitehouse’s infamous blasphemy trial against Gay News.

Andrew Keates, Artistic Director of Queer Theatre, comments, To be joined by Chris Bush, Marcelo Dos Santos and Caroline Bird is an honour and a privilege. Their work is thrilling, generous, and deeply human, and having them inspire other LGBTQIA+ theatre-makers in the room is exactly what Queer Play Reading Club is for. I’m proud of the partnership we’ve forged with Nick Hern Books and with The Railway, and grateful for the queer-run space we’re building together. As Queer Theatre grows, the real joy is seeing queer people gather safely, share our stories out loud, and make the kind of connections that keep artists going.

Matt Applewhite, Publisher & CEO of Nick Hern Books, comments, At Nick Hern Books, our list is shaped by the belief that LGBTQIA+ stories matter – and that they deserve to be read, heard and celebrated out loud. At a time when queer voices are still under threat, spaces like Queer Theatre’s Play Reading Club are small acts of resistance as well as community. We’re proud to stand alongside this work, helping to amplify bold, brilliant LGBTQIA+ plays and the artists who create them.

By Tuesday 24th February, The Railway will have undergone an extensive refurbishment, providing a refreshed setting for Queer Theatre’s growing programme of theatre-making events in Clapham.