Women’s Musical Theatre Initiative: Celebrating Female Songwriters – The Pheasantry  

London’s Playwrights’ Workshop launches Women’s Musical Theatre Initiative: Celebrating Female Songwriters at The Pheasantry, London. 

Pairing up with musical theatre writing duo Barlow and Smith, London Playwrights’ Workshop has launched the Women’s Musical Theatre Initiative, a new development programme for female musical theatre writers.

Following on from a report in The Stage that male writers outnumbered female 9:1 in musical theatre. The Women’s Musical Theatre Initiative (WMTI) was born to address, and combat, that imbalance with an exclusive cabaret featuring a fierce array of female songwriters to launch the initiative.

Speaking about the initiative, London Playwrights’ Workshop director A.C. Smith said: ‘I was shocked to read the statistics reported in The Stage. It seemed like female musical theatre writers were practically invisible. My immediate thought was: we have to do something about this.

“As someone who works in ‘straight’ theatre and as also a book/writer lyricist, it’s been consistently surprising to me to see how far behind musical theatre has lagged in terms of achieving more equal representation of women and BAME artists. It saddens me to think how many talented voices aren’t being heard – either because their talents aren’t taken seriously and developed or their talents have never have been tapped in the first place.”

The WMTI programme will run with three strands. It will act as a platform to showcase female writers, host masterclasses and run an introductory writers’ workshop.

The cabaret opened with Barlow and Smith introducing us to an evening of celebrating female songwriters, and what a celebration it was.

The first performance came from songwriting duo Marlais and Young who treated us to a number straight from their musical F**ked in Marrakech which is being presented at BEAM2018 (Theatre Royal Stratford East, 1-2 March 2018).

Zara Nunn took to the stage next, and played ‘Change the View’ from the musical In Versions. Performed by Simon Willmont, this idyllic song soared through The Pheasantry with similar tones of Pasek and Paul.

Along with hosting the evening, Barlow and Smith also performed their own, witty material, sung by Caroline Sheen.

Each songwriter was superb, but the cabaret was stolen by Maimuna Memon who sang her original song ‘City Lights’ from the musical Electrolyte, accompanied by impressively dexterous violinist Ben Simon and drummer Chris Georgiou.

Rosabella Gregory’s song ‘Love’, from the musical, City Stories, was also a fantastic display of new writing and a beautiful song.

Throughout the cabaret, many talented songwriters showcased their work and demonstrated why the statistic printed in The Stage must change, and although each audience member had their favourite songwriter, everyone left singing the same tune.

Lucy Beirne