Sarah Grochala (born 9 January 1973) is a British playwright. Her plays have been performed at the

Finborough Theatre The Finborough Theatre is a fifty-seat theatre in the West Brompton area of London (part of the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea) under artistic director Neil McPherson. The theatre presents new British writing, as well as UK and world pr ...

Theatre503 Theatre503, formerly the Latchmere Theatre, is a theatre located at 503 Battersea Park Road in Battersea in the London Borough of Wandsworth, above the Latchmere pub. The venue is known for promoting the work of new writers. History The the ...

Hampstead Theatre Hampstead Theatre is a theatre in South Hampstead in the London Borough of Camden. It specialises in commissioning and producing new writing, supporting and developing the work of new writers. Roxana Silbert has been the artistic director since ...

, Arcola Theatre and

Soho Theatre The Soho Theatre is a theatre and registered charity in the Soho district of the City of Westminster, in London, England. It produces and presents new works of theatre, together with comedy and cabaret, across three performance spaces. The the ...

in London. Her plays have been produced internationally by the

Griffin Theatre Griffin Theatre Company is an Australian theatre specialising in new works, based in Sydney. Founded in 1979, it is the resident theatre company at the SBW Stables Theatre in Kings Cross. the artistic director is Declan Green. Artistic direc ...

, Sydney, Tiyatro Yan Etki

Istanbul ) , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = 34000 to 34990 , area_code = +90 212 (European side) +90 216 (Asian side) , registration_plate = 34 , blank_name_sec2 = GeoTLD , blank_i ...

Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with a small portion on the Balkan Peninsula in ...

and on the Toronto Fringe

Toronto Fringe Festival The Toronto Fringe Festival is an annual theatre festival, featuring un-juried plays by unknown or well-known artists, taking place in the theatres of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Several productions originally mounted at the Fringe have later been ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

. Her book on playwriting, ''The Contemporary Political Play'', was published in 2017.

Early life and education

Grochala was born in

Hemel Hempstead Hemel Hempstead () is a town in the Dacorum district in Hertfordshire, England, northwest of London, which is part of the Greater London Urban Area. The population at the 2011 census was 97,500. Developed after the Second World War as a new ...

and grew up in

Nantwich Nantwich ( ) is a market town and civil parish in the unitary authority of Cheshire East in Cheshire, England. It has among the highest concentrations of listed buildings in England, with notably good examples of Tudor and Georgian architecture. ...

, Cheshire. She trained as an actress at the Drama Centre in London, and studied English Language and Literature at St John's College,

Oxford University Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to th ...

Career

Between 1998 and 2006, Grochala worked as actress in theatre and television. She appeared in the television drama '' Every Woman Knows a Secret'' and the TV series ''

Judge John Deed ''Judge John Deed'' is a British legal drama television series produced by the BBC in association with One-Eyed Dog for BBC One. It was created by G.F. Newman and stars Martin Shaw as Mr Justice Deed, a High Court judge who tries to seek real j ...

''. She also starred as

Jo March ''Little Women'' is a coming-of-age novel written by American novelist Louisa May Alcott (1832–1888). Alcott wrote the book, originally published in two volumes in 1868 and 1869, at the request of her publisher. The story follows the lives ...

in the 2004/2005 West End production of Little Women. She studied playwriting on the MPhil in Playwriting Studies at

Birmingham University , mottoeng = Through efforts to heights , established = 1825 – Birmingham School of Medicine and Surgery1836 – Birmingham Royal School of Medicine and Surgery1843 – Queen's College1875 – Mason Science College1898 – Mason Univers ...

, a course created by the British playwright David Edgar. She later gained a PhD in contemporary British playwriting from

Queen Mary, University of London , mottoeng = With united powers , established = 1785 – The London Hospital Medical College1843 – St Bartholomew's Hospital Medical College1882 – Westfield College1887 – East London College/Queen Mary College , type = Public researc ...

. Her early plays ''Open Ground'' (2005) and ''Waiting for Romeo'' (2006) were produced on the fringe in London and Edinburgh. ''Waiting for Romeo'' was revived by Tiyatro Yan Etki in Istanbul in 2014 and ran in rep at the theatre until 2016. The production won the 2015 Ekin Yazin Dostları Theatre Award for Best Play (Small Venue). Her breakthrough play ''S-27'' won the 2007 Protect the Human Playwriting Competition and was also shortlisted for the 2007 King's Cross Award and the 2010 Leah Ryan Award for Emerging Women Writers. ''S-27'' premiered at the

in June 2009. It has since been revived internationally by the

in Sydney in 2010 and by Intersection Theatre on the Toronto Fringe in 2012. In 2011, Grochala was the winner of OffWestEnd.com's Adopt a Playwright Award for her play ''Smolensk''. Her most recent play ''Star Fish'' was shortlisted for the 2016 Nick Darke Award. From 2012 to 2016, she was an associate artist with the theatre company Headlong, where she worked on creating theatrical experiences using digital media. These included: ''The Nether Realm'' (Royal Court 2014) made in collaboration with the visual artist Michael Takeo Magruder, the director

Jeremy Herrin Jeremy Herrin is an English theatre director. He is the artistic director of Headlong Theatre. Career Having trained at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama in Glasgow, Herrin was an assistant director ...

and the playwright

Jennifer Haley Jennifer Haley is an American playwright. She grew up in San Antonio, Texas and studied acting at the University of Texas at Austin for her undergraduate degree. Haley also received a MFA in playwriting at Brown University in 2005, where she ...

; and ''What's She Like'' made in collaboration with the interactive theatre company Coney. In 2019, she wrote for '' Doctor Who'', contributing to the Big Finish spin-off, ''The Eighth of March''. She would write for further releases, including ''The Robots'', ''The First Doctor Adventures'' and ''Lady Christina''.

Personal life

Grochala lives in

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

, and is the course leader of the MA MFA Writing for Stage and Broadcast Media Programme at

Royal Central School of Speech and Drama The Royal Central School of Speech and Drama was founded by Elsie Fogerty in 1906, as The Central School of Speech Training and Dramatic Art, to offer a new form of training in speech and drama for young actors and other students. It became a ...

Publications

Plays

* ''Open Ground'' (Teatro Technis, London 2005) * ''Waiting for Romeo'' (Hill Street Theatre, Edinburgh 2006) * ''Gift'' (Kings Head, London 2008) * ''Viable Alternatives'' (Green Man Festival, Wales 2008) * ''Remains'' (Theatre503, London 2009) * ''S-27'' (Finborough Theatre, London 2009) * ''The Return'' (Birmingham University, 2010) * ''Standing Out of the Light'' (Theatre503, London 2010) * ''Skin'' (Arcola, London 2010) * ''The Beautiful Ones'' (Latitude Festival, England 2011) * ''Red Shoes'' (Chapter Arts, Cardiff; Theatre503, London; Arches, Glasgow 2012) * ''Emperor's New Clothes'' (Cockpit Theatre, London 2012) * ''The Shadow'' (Soho Theatre, London 2014) * ''Little Mermaid'' (Wales Millennium Centre, Cardiff 2014) * ''Alexandria n.'' (Primrose Hill Community Library, London 2015)

Big Finish

The Eighth of March

* ''Narcissus'' (2018)

The Robots

* ''Do No Harm'' (Series 2, 2020) * ''Off Grid'' (Series 4, 2021)

The First Doctor Adventures

* ''The Hollow Crown'' (Volume 5, 2021)

Lady Christina

* ''Outback'' (Series 2, 2021)

The Avengers: The Comic Strip Adaptations

* ''Mother’s Day'' (Volume 05: Steed & Tara King, 2021) * ''Stand and Deliver'' (Volume 06: Steed & Mrs Peel, 2022)

The Fifth Doctor Adventures

* ''God of War'' (Forty: Volume 01, 2022)

The Ninth Doctor Adventures

* ''The False Dimitry'' (Back to Earth, 2022)

Star Cops

* ''Death in the Desert'' (Series 3A; The High Frontier, 2022)

The Fourth Doctor Adventures

* ''The Face in the Storm'' (Series 13, 2024)

Books

* ''The Contemporary Political Play'' (Methuen Drama 2017) * ''The Theatre of Rupert Goold'' (Methuen Drama 2020)

Digital

* ''1984 Digital Double'' (Headlong/Cultural Institute at King's 2013) * ''PRISM'' (Headlong/Cultural Institute at King's 2014) * ''The Nether Realm'' (Headlong/Royal Court 2014) * ''What's She Like'' (Headlong/Coney 2016)

References

Internet Movie Database IMDb (an abbreviation of Internet Movie Database) is an online database of information related to films, television series, home videos, video games, and streaming content online – including cast, production crew and personal biographies, ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Grochala, Sarah 1973 births English dramatists and playwrights Living people Writers from London Alumni of St John's College, Oxford Associate Fellows of the Higher Education Academy