World Première Of Raminder Kaur's BREADTH Will Open At Omnibus Theatre

Sohaya Vision alongside Mukul and Ghetto Tigers have announced the world première of breaDth at Omnibus Theatre. Written by Raminder Kaur, Artistic Director of Sohaya Vision, and directed by Mukul Ahmed, Artistic Director of Mukul and Ghetto Tigers, the production opens on 17 May with previews from 16 May and runs until 3 June.

breaDth is a multi-media, magic realist drama based on true experiences of the pandemic, prejudice, and the care of older people. The script was formed from interviews collected by researchers for the Consortium on Practices of Wellbeing and Resilience among Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic Families and Communities (ESRC).

Raminder Kaur said today: "breaDth is about overcoming the D's that get in the way of our lives - discrimination, depression, delirium...It captures the shattering events around COVID-19 combined with flashbacks to previous pandemics such as the Great Plague. It's informed by people's real-life experiences - funny, surreal, poignant, penetrating. It's about the diversity of people left on the sides as they struggle to catch their breath. After incredible feedback on the R&D in 2022, I'm so excited to see it being produced with a wonderful cast and crew at Omnibus Theatre."

Mukul Ahmed said today: "This collaboration allows a new creative approach of presenting real-life testimonies to uncover a rich web of otherwise unheard stories of people's experiences, resilience and multiple identities as they tried to care for vulnerable people as frontline workers during the pandemic. A talented creative team will retell these stories through a stunning mixture of realism, magical realism, projections, movements and evocative music."

From the Great Plague to the COVID-19 pandemic, the medieval mystic, polymath and jurist, Ibn Khaldun, leads us through the lives of older people and racial minorities who work as carers for them. From football, prejudice to a pet tortoise who lives with a down-to-earth English avatar, we journey through the challenges, loves and humour behind the stories of diverse families living through the pandemic.

Playwright Raminder Kaur has written several scripts for theatre productions and filmed theatre including Bodies staged in 2018, and again as a filmed production in 2021. Her other filmed productions include Kama Sci-Fi and Lalon: Heart of Madness. Her play, Bullets through the Golden Stream, won the Asian Drama Festival at Watermans Arts centre, and her script, Exodus: Asia, Africa, Europe, was a finalist in the BOLD Playwright competition. She has also coproduced an international competition and festival for scriptwriting, RAFTA: Rise Against Fanaticism Through the Arts. She is a researcher based in the School of Global Studies at the University of Sussex.

Mukul Ahmed has directed and toured nationally and internationally, People's Romeo (based on Romeo and Juliet), and an all-female multinational Julius Caesar for Tara Arts. His adaptation of The Adventures of Baron Munchausen in 2007 earned him four stars from The Times theatre critic, and his production of Gauhar Jaan - The Datia Incident in 2018 at Omnibus earned 7 four stars. In 2007, he helped launch Tara Studio as curator of the first season, Hotbed, for young and emerging Global Majority directors. In 2010, he directed Tahmima Anam's A Golden Age for the Southbank Centre. Ahmed also programmed a Black History Month Festival, a Youth Shakespeare Festival season at Tara Arts, and ran the Tara Arts young actors programme, ArtsBeat.