Bog Witch - Dukes Theatre and Cinema

Playwright, performer, documentary-maker and screenwriter Bryony Kimmings (I’m a Phoenix, Bitch, Last Christmas, Channel 4’s The Sex Clinic, BBC Four’s Opera Mums) returns to the stage with Bog Witch -her first solo show in half a decade.

Bog Witch is a show about uncertain times, ecosystem collapse and finding new ways to be happy. Bryony had enough to worry about; mental illness, a sick kid, single motherhood, bills coming out of her ears... she didn’t have time to worry about the planet. She had her coping mechanisms down pat - spending, doing, achieving to fill the void. But she began to wonder if those were the things that were making her unhappy. As with all her previous autobiographical shows Bog Witch follows a part of Kimmings’ real life story... this time the journey of uprooting her and her son’s life to live in a tumbledown cottage in the wilderness... to plug back into nature as a last ditch attempt to be happy again.

Bryony Kimmings said: “Bog Witch is about being the least likely eco-convert. The last person to let go of their capitalist trappings. It explores what happens when ordering things online, drinking from plastic coffee cups, and stuffing my face with Deliveroo no longer brings happiness. Beneath all the bought stuff and façade; the endless distraction and dopamine, we find we are sad animals. Animals who have been disconnected from our ecosystems for too long. This is the story not of dropping out... but of plugging back in, and one that changed absolutely everything.”

Kimmings is inspired by female stories, social taboos, and dismantling power structures. In 2021 she made a public vow to only work on things that would help the planet at this time of climate crisis and eco-system collapse. Her latest screen-writing project is The Rapture, an upcoming psychological eco-thriller series for BBC One, starring Ruth Madeley, and based on the bestselling novel of the same name.