Birds of Paradise Theatre Company

Birds of Paradise Theatre’s artistic vision is of a culture where disabled artists are recognised for the excellence of their work, celebrated for the stories that they bring to the stage and are a vital part of 
the artistic landscape of Scotland.

Our Purpose

…is to be an accessible arts company that produces world-class productions and projects that place disabled artists centre stage and to develop future generations of disabled artists. BOP believes that disabled people continue to experience a lack of equality and considerable barriers within society, including the arts. Our work exists in part to challenge and address these.

We are the only professional, disability-led theatre company in Scotland and we exist to:

• make world-class, innovative and accessible work that embeds Creative Access and is made by disabled and non-disabled artists, writers and theatre-makers drawn from diverse cultures to reach a wide demographic nationally and internationally

• play a key strategic role in Scotland’s theatre ecology and wider arts industry by supporting the sector to nurture the next generation of disabled artists, performers and audiences through addressing barriers to opportunities and involving disabled people in these processes

Wendy Hoose

Duration: 60

Description: Laura and Jake just want sex. Late Friday night drunken sex. Nothing more. No strings attached. But getting your leg over is sometimes more difficult than you think.



Starring James Young and Amy Conachan, Wendy Hoose is about two twenty year olds searching for love in all the wrong places!



Wendy Hoose contains strong language and scenes of a sexual nature. All performances include audio description, BSL and animated surtitles.

People on road: 4/5

Freight: necessary

Freight details: Substantial set required to be toured - please contact for info.

Purposeless Movements

Duration: 75

Description: "What’s so great about purposeful movement? Half the fun in life is not knowing what’s coming next.’Purposeless Movements is a visually stunning new dance theatre piece that riffs on the stories of five guys with cerebral palsy, how it affects their lives, their gender, their masculinity and their movement.Funny and challenging in equal measure, the show will fuse music, video, movement and text as the guys tell humorous and poignant stories of their laughter, their inappropriateness and their tears – stories that ask what it is to move and be moved. How do these stories come together to shape their identities? What do they share with one another and what sets them apart? And how much of this is down to Cerebral Palsy?When they were born the doctors called it Purposeless Movements – for them it’s just how they get around.The production will be accompanied by music performed live on stage. All performances integrate audio description, BSL and animated surtitles.
"What’s so great about purposeful movement? Half the fun in life is not knowing what’s coming next.’

Purposeless Movements is a visually stunning new dance theatre piece that riffs on the stories of five guys with cerebral palsy, how it affects their lives, their gender, their masculinity and their movement.

Funny and challenging in equal measure, the show will fuse music, video, movement and text as the guys tell humorous and poignant stories of their laughter, their inappropriateness and their tears – stories that ask what it is to move and be moved. How do these stories come together to shape their identities? What do they share with one another and what sets them apart? And how much of this is down to Cerebral Palsy?

When they were born the doctors called it Purposeless Movements – for them it’s just how they get around.

The production will be accompanied by music performed live on stage. All performances integrate audio description, BSL and animated surtitles.

People on road: Cast: 4 BSL interpreter Audio describer Musicians: 2 Tech: 2 + two PAs 12 minimum

Freight: necessary

Freight details: Contact for info

Looking 4 Talent

A simple question – where are the disabled performers of the future in Scotland? Following a period of extensive research to find out what’s currently going on around the country… Birds of Paradise are on a talent search throughout Scotland. They’re interested in finding a new generation of artists and performers who they will work with in 2015 to create a new show written by a leading Scottish playwright.

Be BoP Ensemble

At Birds of Paradise we have a role to play in nurturing the next generation of deaf and disabled performers and artists. We aim to work with young disabled people in Scotland to enrich their lives through participating in and engaging with theatre and performance and, through this, to establish Birds of Paradise as a national and international leader in working with young disabled people.

Our Be-BoP Ensemble are a group of young theatre-makers. We have been working with them over the past few years to develop their performing skills and to develop their knowledge of how theatre comes together.

“As a calling card for the new direction for Birds of Paradise, this is a wonderfully full-on, no-holds-barred declaration of intent to produce entertaining theatre with heart, intelligence and flair. It may well be rude at times, but it clearly comes from a Scottish theatre that’s in rude health.” Disability Arts Online

“A vulnerable James Young and a defiantly sexy Amy Conachan star in this outrageously funny comedy of manners” ★★★★ The Guardian

“the production, co-directed by McKnight and Robert Softley Gale, has no time for such soppiness; it is rude, ribald and hilariously off-colour, and bodes tremendously well for the new directorship of Birds of Paradise.” ★★★★ The Guardian

“Writer McKnight is the master of witty wordplay and Young delivers his painfully cruel rejections with perfect timing and zeal.” ★★★★ TV Bomb

“Conachan in particular does a beautiful job of painting Laura as a real woman with needs, wants, desires and obligations, who’s not willing to be repressed by the ‘disabled’ label. ★★★★ TV Bomb

“The knotty problems and see-saw dynamics of the pair who are keen to have sex but don’t know each other is captured through McKnight’s brilliant ear for authentic West of Scotland speech.” ★★★★ Edinburgh Guide

“Julie Brown, whose dry, non- committal tones as observer manage to create a highly comic, virtual ménage a trois.” ★★★★Edinburgh Guide

“unstintingly well acted, totally on the mark and painfully funny” ★★★★ The Herald

“McKnight’s script is sharp, twisting Jake’s Paisley patter to comic vulgarity, while Laura is a perfect foil.” ★★★★ The List

“Unashamedly vulgar, but with a compassionate core, Wendy Hoose is a bold, entertaining and sensitive production.” ★★★★The List