RHYS CHANT
DIRECTOR & THEATRE MAKER
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RHYS CHANT
(THEY/THEM)
Rhys Chant is a Director and Theatre-Maker focused on devised theatre and new works that highlight underrepresented communities, particularly the LGBTQ+ community and young people. Their work explores queer identity and archive, social structures, and inter-generational dynamics through naturalistic storytelling and testimonial theatre-making, drawing on real lived experiences to create honest, resonant narratives that foster connection and authenticity in performance.
As Creative Director of Kitchen Sink Productions, Rhys leads ScriptJam!/ShowJam!, a monthly writing workshop for emerging writers, as well as overseeing the development of the company’s outreach programme. They’ve collaborated with youth-focused initiatives including National Youth Theatre Connections 2024 and Groundlings Theatre (Portsmouth), and currently serve as a Trustee of Chichester Festival Theatre.
Rhys is currently developing and touring Things A Bright Young Queer Can Do, a research-performance project examining the lived experiences of young queer people in contemporary Britain. The piece combines testimonial theatre-making, ensemble narrative, and vignette-style storytelling to craft an eclectic “state of the nation” production. Developed through workshops and interviews, the work captures the complexity, resilience, and joy of queer youth today, and has been performed both in Chichester and London.
CURRENT PROJECTS
THINGS A BRIGHT YOUNG QUEER CAN DO
An evocative and profound translation of the lived experiences of young queer people in modern Britain. Curated from a collection of extensive interviews conducted across the UK, and combining them together in a dynamic presentation of sharp and poignant vignettes to amplify the voices of the LGBTQ+ community.
THINGS A BRIGHT YOUNG QUEER CAN DO seeks to provide agency and empowerment against the growing socio-political backdrop of growing hate crimes and violence. Platforming experiences from across the spectrum of queerhood and engaging a variety of themes and lived experiences to bring out both the positive and negative aspects of society which young LGBTQ+ people face, this new work strives to give breadth to the audience, rather than resonate as ‘the’ experience, moving across different moments of queer experience - showing instances of collective and individual experience in relation to the queer identity and experience.
In creating this piece of performance-research, the process has been met with overwhelming hospitality, providing the opportunity to hear about the brilliant work being done by young queer individuals. Connections have been made with writers, psychologists, teachers, artists, national and local government officials, nurses, veterinarians, and many others—people filled with life and hope.
