Alice Birch (born 1986) is a British playwright and screenwriter. Birch has written several plays, including Revolt. She Said. Revolt Again. for which she was awarded the George Devine Award for Most Promising New Playwright, and Anatomy of a Suicide for which she won the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize. Birch was also the screenwriter for the film Lady Macbeth and has written for such television shows as Succession, Normal People, and the Peabody Award-winning miniseries Dead Ringers.
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Life and career
Early years and education
Birch spent the first five years of her life living with her family at the rural commune Birchwood Hall, near Malvern. Because her parents were unmarried, they decided to give Alice and her sister the surname Birch after the commune's name.
At 18, Birch joined the Royal Court Theatre’s young writers programme and spent a three-month unpaid internship in Los Angeles working for the film production company BenderSpink.
Birch attended Exeter University for her undergraduate degree.
Career
In 2010, Birch participated in 24 Hour Plays at the Old Vic in which writers, directors, actors, and other creatives have 24 hours to create a new play before it is performed. The playwrights were given 6 hours to write a play 15 minutes in length. Birch's play was called And Then There Were Four Little Beats of Four Little Hearts on the Edge of the World.
Birch's first performed full-length play was Many Moons, which premiered in 2011 at Theatre 503 under the direction of Derek Bond. The play follows four characters whose lives seem separate, but then collide. Birch was nominated for the 2011/12 Susan Smith Blackburn prize, an award recognising female playwrights writing in the English language, for Many Moons.
In 2013, Birch's episode of the radio comedy Absolutely Delish was broadcast on BBC Radio 4. Also in 2013, Birch's play Little on the Inside premiered at Latitude Festival. The play is set inside a women's prison.
Birch co-wrote the play Astronauts with a group of 16-19 year olds who later performed the work. Astronauts was inspired by the housing crisis. The play premiered in 2014 with Company Three. Little Light is one of Birch's first plays, though it was not performed until 2015 when it premiered at the Orange Tree Theatre.
Birch's play Revolt. She Said. Revolt Again. was commissioned by the Royal Shakespeare Company, which gave her the prompt, "Well-behaved women seldom make history". Birch wrote the play in three days. The play was inspired by Valerie Solanas' SCUM Manifesto, though Birch took inspiration more from the power behind Solanas' words than from the messages of that work. Revolt premiered with the Royal Shakespeare Company in 2014 as part of Midsummer Mischief. Birch was nominated for the 2014/15 Susan Smith Blackburn prize for writing Revolt and won the George Devine Award for Most Promising New Playwright.
In 2015, Birch developed the play We Want You to Watch with the feminist theatre company RashDash. We Want You to Watch was commissioned by the National Theatre. The play protests the violent and graphic world created by pornography and raises the idea of getting rid of pornography in its entirety. The same year, her play for children, The Lone Pine Club, premiered as a touring production. Birch adapted the story from Malcolm Saville's children's books.
Personal life
Birch lives in Hackney, East London with her partner Sam Pritchard and their two children.
Works
Plays
Many Moons
Little on the Inside
Astronauts
Little Light
Revolt. She Said. Revolt Again.
We Want You to Watch
The Lone Pine Club
Ophelias Zimmer (German with English surtitles)
Anatomy of a Suicide
La Maladie de la Mort (French with English subtitles)
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The House of Bernarda Alba (adapted from the Federico García Lorca’s 1936 play)
Outline. Transit. Kudos.
Romans: A Novel.
Film
Lady Macbeth (2016)
Mothering Sunday (2021)
The Wonder (2022)
The End We Start From (2023)
Die My Love (2025)
Sweetsick (TBA) (Directorial debut)
Television
Succession — Season 2 (2019)
Normal People (2020)
Conversations with Friends (2022)
Dead Ringers (2023)
The Ministry of Time (in development)
