Inkwell Productions: Five years on.

History.

Inkwell Productions was founded in 2017 as a theatre company with a passion for both classic and contemporary voices. Producing work by legendary playwrights such as Anton Chekhov, Harold Pinter, and Samuel Beckett, the company also championed new writing and emerging talent in the east of England, including actors and literature students from UEA. What began as a local theatre initiative gradually

expanded over several years, with productions reaching audiences across Suffolk, Norfolk, Cambridge, Birmingham, and London.

Inkwell came to a close in 2020 when, like many theatre companies, it could not withstand the financial pressures brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic. The challenges of that period were compounded by changes within the board, which placed further strain on the company’s finances and overall capacity, eventually making it untenable to continue. Even so, everyone involved came away with a wealth of professional industry experience, and the company’s legacy remained in the skills, knowledge, and relationships built through its work.

My role.

My role within Inkwell Productions began as a company liaison, creating original soundscapes for plays. One of the most notable was for Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot, where I used a range of synthesizers and manipulated synth patches to create distinct atmospheres, as well as leitmotifs for different characters. This drew on similar skills to those I have used in my work in musical theatre, where music and sound help shape character, mood, and dramatic pacing.

Over time, I became more involved in the wider structure and running of the company, and after a few years I took on the role of Operations Director and joined the board. As a board member, I contributed to financial planning, business decisions, and wider creative discussions, including programming, play ideas, and location scouting for future opportunities.

Alongside this strategic role, I was also involved in the practical, day-to-day running of productions. This included supporting personal welfare, overseeing rehearsals alongside the Creative Director, producing aspects of the plays, and ensuring that people, resources, and logistics were in place throughout the production process.

Character bulding.

Joining Inkwell at the age of 18 was not something I could have predicted in 2017. I had decided not to go straight to university after college, as I was uncertain whether continuing formal study would benefit me when I was still unsure about music as a career. I had reached a high level of ability as a pianist through years of dedication, but I did not yet know whether music was something I wanted to pursue professionally or simply something I loved deeply.

Joining Inkwell, initially almost on a whim, became one of the most character-building experiences of my life. It gave me the opportunity to travel with colleagues across the UK and abroad, build lasting friendships, and learn a great deal about myself under pressure. It was within this environment that I first began to understand the realities of the industry: performance and production do not pause, and creative work continues whether or not you feel ready.

What began as a relatively safe role in music-making for productions gradually developed into a far more embedded position within the company, stretching across multiple areas of the business. At times, I was completely out of my depth, but in hindsight that was exactly where so much of the learning happened. It was through doing, rather than waiting to feel ready, that I developed practical industry skills in communication, organisation, leadership, business awareness, and creativity in context.

What Inkwell taught me most powerfully was the importance of responsibility to one’s craft, and the resilience needed to face rejection, disagreement, and pressure. These are not always comfortable experiences, but they are part of creative work, and they can become catalysts for growth if you are willing to learn from them.

One of my first major mistakes came during a higher-profile performance of Waiting for Godot. The character of Lucky wore ripped, bloodied trousers, which needed washing after the first performance ready for the second. I washed them, but failed to dry them. At the same time, as part of my producing role, I was also responsible for preparing food for the character of Pozzo to eat on stage. Rushing between multiple responsibilities — dealing with the wet costume, preparing the food, setting up my soundscape, and trying to get everything ready with only a short time before the audience arrived — I handled the situation badly. The result was that the actors went on stage in soaking-wet costumes and ate raw chicken. Reflecting on this now, I am fortunate that no one became unwell, as the consequences could have been serious both personally and professionally.

Although it was an embarrassing mistake, it became one of the most formative lessons of my time with the company. From that point onwards, I became far more attentive, strategic, and disciplined in the way I organised my time and responsibilities. I learned to plan properly, think ahead, and respect the trust placed in me within a production environment. In that sense, the experience was genuinely character-building: it taught me that professionalism is not simply about talent or intention, but about reliability, preparation, and accountability. Looking back, my time with Inkwell remains one of the most formative journeys of my life, not despite its mistakes, but partly because of them.

Five years on.

Although Inkwell ended more abruptly than any of us could have imagined, its legacy is something I still carry with me today, and much of my practice now reflects what I learned there. More than anything, Inkwell taught me that creative work only truly functions when people come together. Building community within arts projects, respecting one another, and learning from each other are among the most valuable parts of being a creative practitioner. You develop the practical skills needed for the work, but you also learn about yourself: what needs to change, how you can improve, what you are willing to give, and which values matter most to you.

Although reflective practice is something I only came to know formally through university, I can now see that it had always existed within my work. It was already present in the constant process of learning from mistakes, refining skills, and trying to navigate a fickle industry with greater confidence and awareness. Through that process, I began to build an identity around what I can do, rather than what I cannot, and to recognise that the more I grow, the smaller those limitations become.

It also reinforced for me the importance of new art.

Although Inkwell produced a mixture of classic and contemporary work, one of its central values was helping to bring new writing and new creative voices into the world. That has remained deeply important in my own composition practice. I continue to ask how my craft fits into the world around me, how it might make a difference, and what it might help to move forward. For me, it is not about being a trailblazer for its own sake, but about testing, failing, learning, and succeeding all at once in order to create new, exciting, inclusive work that speaks meaningfully to someone.