Media Mentions

8th May 2018

 

I would admit to being slightly unprepared for an evening which kicked off with me being marched to the small stage to both impersonate Brexit and then be married to Theresa May by a grisly Mogg-alike figure. The capacity audience were polite enough to give me a generous round of applause as I slunk back to my corner seat to try and make some sense of my new marital status, but I soon relaxed into appreciation of the sheer joy of this evening of theatrical talent emerging.

 

This first work that risked my contribution was called ‘A Play About Theresa May’ and was both topical and clever, with Amie M Marie giving an uncannily nuanced version of our current Prime Minister albeit with a clown nose...​

7th August 2021

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Playwright, Amie Maria Marie speaks her mind with extraordinary openness. “The long and short of it was, I was really frustrated with Theresa May. I didn’t like her as home secretary. I didn’t like her Go Home vans, which cost a lot of money and got barely anyone to self deport.” 

 

The driving force behind Amie’s work has been politics. But as she quickly notes, “I think as a society, we tend to underestimate the significance of politics in our everyday lives. Food is politics, home is politics, the quality of the potholes in your road is politics.” 

 

She laughs, but not for long. Besides, Marie is, in fact, deadly serious. And yet whilst politics might not define her work, it certainly drives it. In a political world where decisions have such far-reaching implications – a matter of life and death for some – theatre feels an appropriate way to illustrate feelings towards the actions of our political leaders.

 

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In Marie’s play, written a year after the Brexit referendum, Theresa May is a clear culprit. “ I view her as a ‘white feminist’ because she focuses on being the right kind of person, whereas intersectional feminism says people of different demographics have different struggles, and you can’t have a one size fits all.” 

 

“I think she oversimplified her vision of a Conservative utopia to exclude people who needed help from the central government. I especially disrespect her for the negative influence she’s had on trans rights. It’s just led to the rise of transphobia.” Frustration pervades her tone, “[May] said she’d do one thing, and instead she’s hurt a lot of people.” 

11th May 2018

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In the latter stages of its development, the satire showed Theresa May detailing to the audience her plans for Brexit in a speech. Whilst trying to do so she was haunted by the ‘Ghost of Tory Past’ in the form of Jacob Rees-Mogg, as well as being ridiculed by ‘two pints Garage’, a comically dressed Nigel Farage.

 

The play was fantastically set up, focusing on the issues that went further than just Brexit whilst also getting the audience involved, including a member being proposed to so she could ‘marry Brexit’...

11th March 2021

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The two playtexts are accompanied in this publication with several additional pieces of content that serve to illustrate the intentions of the work as well as highlight its general production history, from reviews to essays on comedy as social responsibility. In particular, there is the unusual but fascinating inclusion of a government document detailing the events of an “incident” in which the playwright got into character and gave a performance of her prankster Prime Minister in the House of Commons itself, which makes for absurdly entertaining reading.

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The Play About Theresa May is a call to arms, emphatically insisting that we must refuse our politicians the opportunity to quietly walk away with blood on their hands, no matter how silly or irrelevant they seem. But it’s not just an academic treatise; this is political theatre in its purest form. The reflective essays and practical explorations proudly showcase its mission to help instigate genuine, impactful change for the better.

11th February 2021

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Marie provides an especially important perspective as a queer, disabled writer, and comedian: belonging to two of the groups most marginalised by Tory leadership.

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On the one hand, certain references date the play. On the other, the play can be harshly prescient. Jokes that once may have been played small, become harder to laugh with and easier to grimace at.

 

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The play illustrates the failure of senior Tories to engage with – let alone convince us they believe – their own rhetoric. May repeats mantras which she’s well aware make as much sense as the ramblings of King Lear. Visual representations of sound bites, real statistics woven into dialogue may shock you. But that shock has not translated to a change in voting habits for the last 10 years. A play designed to tackle complacency has [] created an incriminating portrait of it...

20th June 2018

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Amie M Marie, 22, has invested her savings to take A Play About Theresa May to venues around England and Scotland.

The political clown show has been heavily inspired by Italian playwright and left-wing activist Dario Fo's 20th-centuary theatre classic Accidental Death of an Anarchist. 

It pokes fun at the political elite and the way they frequently change their minds, say nonsensical things, and can become caught in a loop of failure.

A Play About Theresa May is a fast-paced, two-person spoof show featuring an impressive number of costume changes and a minimal set.

To promote their show, [they] staged a publicity stunt in the Houses of Parliament earlier this year after entering the Palace of Westminster under the presence of taking part in an audio tour...

15th March 2021

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An actress, comedian and writer educated in Bishop's Stortford has turned her own satirical play which pokes fun at the UK's political elite into a book.

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In it, Amie shares her reflections and an interview transcript about the design process and intentions of the piece.

 

Her work could inspire budding thespians in Stortford. “I’ve arranged with the head of drama at Hockerill to supply copies of my play for the theatre IB students to study for their director’s handbook coursework in which students plan how they would stage a play,” she said.

2nd March 2021

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This is a very strong and very stable play.

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From a local playwright and UEA graduate, Amie M Marie, this newly published work is the combined volume of scripts, reflections, and reviews on the satirical stage play of the same name.

Following Theresa May’s 2016 ascension to leader of the Conservative Party and Prime Minister, the former Home Secretary is out of her depth and unrepentantly dapping crocodile tears. She drags the audience to the stage to help her make decisions and struggles to unite the divided nation. Read two very different editions of The Play About Theresa May, one from the initial 2017 production and the other from the 2018 tour...