Thistledown Theatre

We believe that theatre is for everyone. 

We are a nomadic company of actors and creatives brought together by a shared love of making theatre. We aren’t fussy about where we do this - to date, we have performed in gardens, old university libraries, halls and magnificent listed buildings. It isn’t always easy to squeeze a show into a non-traditional space but we love the challenge and the effect that it has on our productions and audiences.

Accessibility is important to us. We always offer early bird tickets to our shows (usually at around 50% of the regular price of a ticket) and are proud to have always made Pay What You Can tickets available for each of our runs. Whatever your financial circumstances, we believe you have the right to experience and enjoy theatre. We have also trialled Relaxed performances (most recently in our 2017 outdoor production of Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing) and hope to offer more of these in future.

We hope you will come and see exactly who we are and what we do for yourself. We love meeting new people!

Producer
Jamie Potton

Jamie is the company's producer. Previous producing credits include Our Town (2004) in which he made a cameo appearance as Wally Webb. Most recently, he has appeared on stage in Oxford in Eleven One's production of Blue Stockings (2015). Jamie handles all the financials for the company as well as sponsorship and community partnership arrangements. He's also the first point of contact for educational groups.

Artistic Director
Laurence Goodwin

Laurence is one of the company's artistic directors. She produces and directs for the Company and most recently appeared as Myra Arundel in our 2017 production of Hay Fever. In Oxford, Laurence has previously directed for the Oxford Theatre Guild (Hay Fever, 2014) and the Bartholomew Players (Relative Values, 2016) as well as appearing in productions of Pride and Prejudice (2013), The Importance of Being Earnest (2014) and Night Must Fall (2015). Outside Oxford, she has also appeared at Theatre Memphis in productions of The Violet Hour (Rosamund Plith), Pride and Prejudice (Lydia Bennet) and Our Town (Chorus) and at GCT in The Last Night of Ballyhoo (Sunny Freitag) and The Importance of Being Earnest (Cecily Cardew). She is also a choral singer and voice-over artist.

artistic director
Sarah Pyper

Sarah is one of the company's artistic directors. She has been acting since the age of three; more recent credits in Oxford include Pride and Prejudice (2013), Dr. Faustus (2013) and Blue Stockings (2015). She has also performed several times at the Edinburgh Fringe. Sarah co-directed Hay Fever with Laurence in 2014 and is now an instrumental part of Thistledown, helping to choose and nurture projects for the company. She also performs regularly with Smoke & Mirrors. Sarah is our resident social media expert and maintains our Twitter feed and Instagram accounts.

company Member
Emily Saddler

Emily is a member of the company, appearing as Jane Fairfax in Emma (2016) and Emily in Brontë (2017). She co-directed the company's summer production of Much Ado About Nothing (2017) and stage-managed 2017's Hay Fever. Emily has also directed and performed with Durham Student Theatre, with roles including Emily Webb in Our Town and Maggie in Tusk Tusk. She also recently directed Hamlet as part of the Shakespeare Schools Festival in Oxford (2016). 

CONTACT

Please send any queries to hello@thistledowntheatre.com.