About Us

Crying Out Loud

Making extraordinary theatre happen

Forging  Foraging  Farming

COL is at the heart of shaping the landscape of contemporary performance. Forever seeking new partners to collaborate with, COL is committed to create work that will mark the mind.

Rummaging through theatres, studios, rehearsal rooms and workshops, COL has a commitment to champion the new, the nascent, the necessary.

Working with and for artists COL nurtures both projects and individuals, from the hatching of an idea to the birth of the new.

Established in 2002, Crying Out Loud is an organisation that holds the work of artists at its centre. As a pioneer of the Creative Producer, mixing the established with the embryonic, the experimental with the exceptional, COL has since been creating memorable events for festivals and theatres in the UK, USA, Australia and Europe.

Daring to be different at a time when work for the young was seen to be secondary, COL set out to trailblaze a new way of thinking about contemporary performance for audiences of all ages. This has led to the creation of work that is no longer secondary but seminal, serious and something to write home about.

COL has introduced International artists to the UK such as James Thiérrée and Collectif AOC from France; Taoub from Morocco; Italy's TPO;  Race Horse Company from Finland; Dan Zanes from USA; Laika and Inne Goris from Belgium and European artists Aurélia and Victoria Thiérrée Chaplin, Cie XY and Circo de la Sombra.

The PIPs (Performance in Progress) have developed UK artists creating Oogly Boogly, Tom Morris and Guy Dartnell, Stretch, Sophia Clist, Craig Vear, Nick Burge and Ragnhild Olsen, VEX, Simon Parker, Call of the Wild, Blind Summit.

Other activities include curating special events for Manchester International Festival, The Roundhouse and Somerset House's Free Time.

Board

Gavin Stride (Chair), Sarah MacNee, Billy Ridgers, Chris Thomson, Jeni Walwin, Steve Clarke

Regular collaborators

Rachel Clare - Artistic Director
Philippa Barr - General Manager
Julia Carruthers - Producer
Marie Remy - Strategic Development
Minnie Boardman - Administrator
Elodie Peltier - Project Manager
Steve Ehrlicher - Finance
Slavka Jovanovic - Education Consultant
Martha Oakes - Press
Kath Gorman - Development
John Ellingsworth - House Writer/Blogger
Hannah Edy - Photographer

Supporters/Funders
We are grateful to the following organisations for their support:

Arts Council England, Awards for All, Columbia Foundation Fund of the Capital Community Foundation, Jack Petchey Foundation, The Goldsmiths' Company, The Helen Hamlyn Trust, The Moose Foundation.

Thanks to

Pam Vision and Jo Hammett.

Also to Anne Engel, Leah Townley, Stella Tachtara, Hannah Bruce, Emma Gladstone, Lucy Campbell, Richard Haughton, Pearlfisher, B and B Studio.