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Riva Theatre and The Playwright’s Laboratory in association with Park Theatre present

Sorry We Didn't Die at Sea

By Emanuele Aldrovandi

WRITER | EMANUELE ALDROVANDI
TRANSLATOR | MARCO YOUNG   
DIRECTOR | DANIEL EMERY
PRODUCER | KATHARINE FARMER
SET AND COSTUME DESIGNER | ALYS WHITEHEAD
SOUND DESIGNER AND CREATIVE ASSOCIATE | JAMIE LU
LIGHTING DESIGNER | CATJA HAMILTON
STAGE MANAGER | NELL THOMAS

Emanuele Aldrovandi

Emanuele Aldrovandi is an Italian playwright. He is Artistic Director of Associazione Teatrale Autori Vivi. In 2013, with Homicide House, he won the Riccione/Tondelli Award. He has also won the Pirandello National Award with Felicità, the Fersen Award with Il Generale, the Hystrio Award and the Mario Fratti Award with Farfalle. He has written original plays and adaptations for leading Italian theatres such as ERT Emilia Romagna National Theater, Elfo Puccini Theatre and Teatro Stabile di Torino National Theater. He has collaborated with established Italian theatre companies like MaMiMò and ATIR, and translated plays including Trainspotting, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time and The Laramie Project into Italian. He was one of the European playwrights selected by Fabulamundi Playwriting Europe, and his plays have been translated, performed and published in English, German, French, Spanish, Polish, Slovenian, Czech, Catalan and Arabic.

Marco Young

Marco is a British-Italian translator and actor. He has been translating commercially since 2018. He began translating Italian theatre into English in early 2020, and is particularly interested in politically engaged contemporary Italian pieces discussing migration, journeys and the threat of the far-right. He was a mentee on the 2022-23 Foreign Affairs Theatre Translator Mentorship Programme, for which his translation of Suburban Miracles by Gabriele Di Luca was showcased at Camden People’s Theatre in January 2023. His translation of Allarmi by Emanuele Aldrovandi received a rehearsed reading at Omnibus Theatre in July 2023. This translation of Sorry We Didn’t Die at Sea, the piece’s first British-English version, was first staged at Seven Dials Playhouse in July 2022. He was a member of Mercury Theatre Colchester’s Producer Development Programme 2022-2023.

Daniel Emery

Daniel is a European director and translator from South London. He is associate director of both Peckham Levels Theatre and Shipwright, Deptford, staging radical live work in South East London. Daniel is a committee member of translation collective Art Translated. He is co-director, with Marco Young, of Riva Theatre, a production company focussed on bringing plays from abroad to UK stages. He holds an MSc in Political Sociology, with a research focus on  necropolitics and the sociological valency of artistic production. Daniel’s practice spans theatre and comedy. As director, his work includes: Pillow Talk (Pleasance, Edinburgh; Second City, Chicago; UCB, New York), Allarmi (Omnibus Theatre), Peter Pan: A Cabaret Pantomime (Shipwright), John Tothill: The Last Living Libertine (Pleasance), and the initial run of Sorry We Didn’t Die at Sea (Seven Dials Playhouse). 

Katharine Farmer

Katharine Farmer is the Artistic Director of The Playwright’s Laboratory, a company that provides a network for global theatre professionals who support, develop and programme new work. Through TPL Katharine has developed and produced readings and workshops of 25 new plays in the UK, and works in partnership with over 30 world-class theatres including Hampstead Theatre and Papatango New Writing Prize. Katharine also directs and produces full-scale productions under her theatre company Blue Touch Paper Productions. Most recently, Katharine’s production of ‘Never Not Once’ at Park Theatre received 4 and 5 star reviews from national press such as The Guardian. Previous directing credits include Southwark Playhouse, The Other Palace, Warwick Arts Centre and The Theatre Chipping Norton. Katharine is currently an Artistic Associate at Arcola Theatre. 

Alys Whitehead

Alys Whitehead is a Scenographer based in London and the South East. She likes working with new and abstract writing and is passionate about making work thoughtfully with a particular aim to be as sustainable and waste-free as possible. She is an Associate Designer of Dissident Theatre and NDT Broadgate. As designer, theatre includes: Candy (Park Theatre), Snowflakes (Park Theatre), The Retreat (Finborough), Lysistrata (Lyric Hammersmith), SAD (Omnibus), Maddie (Arcola).

As associate designer, theatre includes: Wordplay (Royal Court), Zoe’s Peculiar Journey Through Time (Theatre Rites/Southbank Centre & International Tour), Sea Creatures (Hampstead).

As assistant designer, theatre includes: Dixon and Daughters (National).

Jamie Lu 

Jamie is a London-based scenographer, sound designer. Jamie’s theatre credits as sound designer include: Declan (Camden People's Theatre, EdFringe23), Spin (Hope Theatre, EdFringe23), Going For Gold, Road (Chelsea Theatre), Mother's Day, Grills (Camden People's Theatre), Burnout (R&D, Vault Festival and tour), Still Here (Jack Studio Theatre), Hedda Gabler (Reading Rep), Smoke, Tokyo Rose (Southwark Playhouse), Iphigenia (Hope Theatre), Nanny (R&D with Folio Theatre), fester (R&D with Halfpace Theatre), A Gig for Ghosts (Soho Theatre), The Apology, We Started to Sing, Broken Lad (Arcola Theatre), Paradise Lost (Shipwright), The Unicorn, What The Heart Wants, How To Build a Wax Figure (Edinburgh Fringe 2022), Sorry We Didn't Die at Sea (Seven Dials Playhouse), The Blue House (Blue Elephant Theatre), Dirty Hearts (Old Red Lion Theatre).

As Assistant Sound Designer: Henry V (Donmar Warehouse). Sound design for Audio play: The Dream Machine (Fizzy Sherbet).

Catja Hamilton

As Lighting Designer: Public: The Musical, The Importance of Being… Earnest?, Wonderdrug (Pleasance Courtyard), Agrippina (Jackson’s Lane), The Oyster Problem, The Anarchist, Duck, Shake the City (Jermyn Street Theatre), Five Years With The White Man (King’s Head Theatre), Lesbian Space Crime, Hot Gay Time Machine (Soho Theatre), Scratches, SNAIL, Acid’s Reign, how we love, TUNA, Take Care (VAULT Festival), Cassandra (Omnibus Theatre and UK tour), Time and Tide (UK tour), Dolly, Another America, The 4thCountry (Park Theatre); Paradise Lost (The Shipwright), The Boatswain’s Mate (Arcola and UK tour); An Intervention (Riverside Studios), Lizard King (UK tour), Patient Light (The Undercroft), I Have Heard You Calling in the Night (Union Theatre).

As Associate Lighting Designer: Anansi The Spider (Unicorn Theatre), The Marriage of Alice B Toklas by Gertrude Stein (Jermyn Street Theatre), Running with Lions (Lyric Hammersmith), Romeo and Juliet (Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre), Botticelli in the Fire (Hampstead Theatre).