Sap

The bark creeps up my body like a rising sea level. I wonder what will happen when it reaches my heart. When a woman tells a lie to her girlfriend, a seed is planted that starts to grow in the darkness. Now roots are cracking through the pavement and branches are coming in at the windows. As she starts to see things that no one else can, she becomes the focus of some seriously unwanted attention. A queer urban fable about passion, power and photosynthesis, a contemporary thriller with ancient roots, Rafaella Marcus's Sap, her first full-length stage play, opened at Roundabout @ Summerhall, as part of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, in August 2022.

Rafaella Marcus is a writer, director and dramaturg from South London. As writer, her work for audio includes The Last Love Song of Suzie Costello (Big Finish); Cry Havoc! Ask Questions Later, Trice Forgotten (Rusty Quill); The Gift, The You Play: small acts, The You Play Volume II: The Haunted Woman (45North/Atticist/EKP). Sap is her first full-length stage play. Their work as director focuses on new writing, often bringing to the stage marginalised voices. Recent directing credits include: BLUBBER (R&D); Richard II (RADA); Stop Kiss (Above The Stag); I Have a Mouth and I Will Scream (VAULT Festival - 2018 People's Choice Award winner); Bury the Dead (Finborough Theatre); Alley. Pearls. Gunshot. (The Yard); Spooky Action at a Distance, Crave (Bunker Theatre); The Wild Party, The Window/Blank Pages (The Hope Theatre); Sonya and Andrey (Sheffield Theatres); Laughing Boy (site specific, Bethnal Green). Work as Associate Director includes: Blithe Spirit (Harold Pinter Theatre); Fury (Guildhall); The Cause (Jermyn Street Theatre). Work as Assistant Director includes: Emilia (Vaudeville Theatre); Pericles (Shakespeare's Globe); Romeo and Juliet, The Wind in the Willows (Chester Performs); Boeing Boeing,Afterplay, Love Your Soldiers, The Winter's Tale (Sheffield Theatres); The Killing of Sister George (Arts Theatre). Rafaella trained on the Birkbeck Theatre Directing MFA. In 2021, she was awarded an MGCFutures bursary to establish a new free script-reading scheme, supplying essential feedback to writers otherwise unable to access it. They were the runner-up of the JMK Award 2021.