Danusia has always led playwrighting workshops and over the last 15 years has focused on teaching marginalised groups including prisoners, women in refuge, the elderly, the homeless and special needs groups. At the end of each ten week writing course, she shares the work of the participants, performed by professional actors whom she directs, to an invited audience. It is from leading these workshops that she developed the desire to tell these groups’ stories to wider audience hence Penned Up. The Hal Company also intends to tour her play about the lives of the elderly, The Wisdom Club and her play about women in refuge Tough Love. All plays having the same aim, to shine a light on these groups’ stories. Hal will tour the plays over the next 5 years and will continue delivering the playwrighting workshops to
marginalised groups.
The Hal Company was recently approached by the Eastern Region Development Manager for St Giles Charity and asked to deliver playwrighting to groups of women at risk of offending, prisoners and ex-prisoners. Hal will be the contractor for the Eastern region and we are hoping that this will help fund future tours.
Danusia Iwaszko is an award winning playwright and very experienced theatre director. Her play Still Life, won London’s One Person Playwrighting Competition and was staged in London, Ireland, The Stables Sydney, and at the Edinburgh Festival and won The Women and Words Competition. (Published by Unthank Books) It led her to be invited to join Paines Plough writing group. Her first full length play, One Glass Wall, (published by Oberon Books) was staged at Theatre 503 and led her to being invited to be Attached Writer at The National Theatre in 2006. Her other plays include: The Force of Nature, In My Fathers House, Wonderful and The Creation for The Theatre Royal York, (The Creation won York Theatre’s Modern Mystery Competition) The Lincoln Road for Eastern Angles, A and E, Oran’s Message, and Ascension for Menagerie Theatre and A Labour of Love, and The Wisdom Club for The Theatre Royal Bury St Edmunds and also for Bury, Between The Cracks a co-pro with Mind focusing on women with personality disorder.
