Don't miss the work-in-progress showing of
I Declare At My Own Risk, written and performed by
Alina Serban, at
Soho Theatre on
Friday the 4th December at
2pm, supported by
Tara Arts and
Arts Council England.
This play is the autobiographical story of Alina Serban's journey from a 'gypsy ghetto' in Bucharest, to the Romanian care system and, ultimately, to New York and London to pursue her education and tell her story on stage.
I Declare At My Own Risk has been widely performed across Europe in countries including Romania, Hungary, Italy and France, gathering considerable critical acclaim. In the UK, the play was performed at the RADA Festival in 2013 and was subsequently offered a development workshop at Oval House Theatre and a short performance run at Tara Arts in 2014.
This work-in-progress showing will mark the culmination of a two week R&D period at the Turner Contemporary in Margate, prior to a full production of the play in Autumn 2016.
With a referendum on the UK's membership of the EU on the near horizon and right-wing English Nationalism on the rise, a revival of an updated version of Alina Serban's play will be extremely timely.
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Writer and Performer
Alina Serban is a graduate of Tisch Scool of the Arts at New York University and the MA Theatre Lab programme at RADA. Recent acting credits include
The House Project and
The Sun That Casts No Shadows for The Brighton Laboratory;
Turfed for the London International Festival of Theatre;
I Declare At My Own Risk at Tara Arts and
The Last Enemy for the BBC. As a writer, she recently produced
Home, a play about London immigrants for Rich Mix and has been commissioned by the Romanian Arts Council and Norwegian Cultural Fund to create a new play about Roma slavery called
Untold Stories. She is one of four practitioners chosen to have an ongoing artistic residency with LIFT in Tottenham. Currently, she is working on
Roma-Sapiens which premiered this autumn in Berlin and she was recently invited to give a performance based on
I Declare At My Own Risk and
Home at the Stockholm Literature Festival.
