Ladybird Productions on The Other Room
Writing about mortality and end-of-life care is no simple feat, yet Ladybird Productions’ upcoming play The Other Room navigates this emotionally heavy territory with a rare balance of heartbreak, honesty, and dark humor. Born out of writer Sarah Rickman’s own vivid dreams and personal reflections on grief and caregiving, the play focuses on mid-life women, a demographic so often balancing child-rearing with caring for aging family members.
Selected out of over 50 submissions for Proforca Theatre Company’s prestigious HERE | FOR 2026 season at the Lion & Unicorn Theatre, The Other Room explores what happens when death takes over a household, yet life inconveniently keeps getting in the way. We caught up with Ladybird Productions’ (Sarah and Ciara Pouncett) to discuss finding light in the shade, amplifying mid-life stories, and bringing this deeply human piece to the stage.
Writing about mortality and end-of-life care can be emotionally heavy territory. What was the initial spark or personal experience that inspired you to write The Other Room?
It is hard to believe but Sarah dreamt much of the play. At the time, she had been working on another two-hander when two of her very close friends lost their parents. In supporting them it brought back memories of her own experience of death, grief and end of life care, and made her think about the very different ways we respond when someone we love is dying. Something we all inevitably come to experience at some point in our lives
There is no one way to deal with the news someone is going to die, just as there is no one way to handle their death afterwards. The assimilation of grief is ongoing, it isn’t one single emotion, and end of life stories are as much about living as they are about dying.
Whilst we may be in our infancy as a company ,as midlife women we bring a plethora of experience. Ladybird Productions amplifies the stories of mid-life women; women who are often navigating these emotions and experiences while sandwiched between bringing up children and teens and caring for their parents and older family members. There are so many stories, often unseen and untold, about the complexities of that stage of life; love, loss, responsibility, change and everything that exists alongside them.
The play is described as blending plenty of humor alongside heartbreak. As a writer, how do you find genuine comic relief in such a sensitive, grief-laden environment without undercutting the emotional weight of the story?
I’m not sure that I always do… No, it’s a hard balance to find but I think it is essential. Gallows humour is a release when everything is too overwhelming. The Other Room is darkly funny. That’s important. Audiences need this, we give them permission to breathe, to laugh and to cry. Otherwise, it becomes just a bland trope and therefore lazy story. We need light and shade in life and in death.
The dynamic between Grace and Themba centres on mutual impact; Grace confronting her hidden exhaustion, and Themba re-evaluating his own set-aside dreams. How did you approach crafting their dialogue so that their growing intimacy feels earned despite their initial friction?
They existed already in my head, so I simply let them exist on the page and, now, on the stage. I didn’t set out to map every stage of their relationship or decide where it needed to go. Their evolution felt like a natural progression, and I followed where they led me.
What mattered was allowing their intimacy to build through the small things; what they reveal, what they hold back, the moments of friction and the moments when they begin to recognise something of themselves in each other. So much of their story is about the unsaid and their relationship develops because of who they are, rather than because the story needs it to.
Although Chris’s illness is the catalyst for the narrative, his secret decision to hire Themba sets the plot in motion. How did you approach writing a character whose presence, and impending absence, hangs so heavily over the household?
Chris’s decision to hire Themba is an act of agency and as Grace says “ever the control freak”. Although his illness is the catalyst for the story, I didn’t want Chris to simply become the reason everything happens. He needed to be felt through the effect he has on the people around him. And, as with much of the play, it is what is left unsaid, and who is not there, that drives the real story.
Everyone gets to have their own relationship with Chris, their own feelings about what is happening, and their own version of who he is.
The content advisory notes a “comic treatment of religious texts”. Without giving away spoilers, how do belief, faith, or ritual factor into how the characters cope with death and carry on living?
I think that is more a reference to a few funny lines rather than any kind of insight into the story.
The Other Room was selected out of more than 50 applications to be part of Proforca Theatre Company’s HERE | FOR 2026 season at the Lion & Unicorn Theatre. What does it mean for Ladybird Productions to be included in a festival specifically designed to champion breakout, next-level work?
It means a huge amount to us and is a real affirmation of the work we at Ladybird Productions are trying to do. In a world where “new and emerging” often refers to youth, it is a clear indication that what we are doing is important and that there is a space for new voices and new work at every stage of life.
As a small, independent company, opportunities to put our work in front of new audiences and alongside such talented companies as Codex and Pither, who are pushing themselves and their work forward, are incredibly inspiring.
For us, it’s also about being part of a wider conversation. Ladybird Productions is interested in telling stories about mid-life women that are often unseen or overlooked whilst also ensuring we are supporting the huge amount of female talent out there to bring our stories to life with a female led production team across the board. Having The Other Room recognised in this way gives us a chance to bring that story to a new audience. We’re hugely grateful to Proforca for believing in the play and giving it a place in the HERE | FOR 2026 season.
The HERE | FOR season is built around concrete support, offering financial backing, rehearsal space, marketing, and mentorship to help shows find life beyond a single fringe run. How has having this structured mentorship and practical investment shaped your development process as a writer for this staging?
I think one of the largest issues within the industry, particularly fringe and small scale theatre, is lack of investment. Proforca have put their money where their mouth is with the HERE | FOR season. They wanted to see more engaging and inspiring shows start their lives at The Lion and unicorn and they are genuinely enabling that to happen.
The free rehearsal space, support with auditions, tech issues, David and Mathew being available for advice, at all times (sorry) and the financial and emotional support have all made a real difference.
Ladybird Productions are very lucky to have Proforca backing us.
Ladybird Productions previously saw fantastic success with Kindling at the Park Theatre. Did writing The Other Room feel like a natural evolution from Kindling, or were you deliberately aiming for a different structural and thematic direction?
Kindling is a highly energetic and darkly comedic (see a theme developing) play with five larger-than-life characters. We wanted to move in a different direction for our next show and, as Sarah mentioned, she was already working on a new two-hander when The Other Room popped into her subconscious.
So, in that sense it was natural evolution, but we don’t want to be too prescriptive about our projects. We’re interested in good stories and in giving writers, performers and creatives, the opportunity to explore experiences that might not otherwise be seen.
Ideally our work will continue to focus on the experiences of mid-life women – whether that is on or off stage and, ideally, both. But beyond that, we want to remain open to where the story takes us and who takes us there. Each project can be completely different, and that’s part of what makes it exciting.
Finally, for Everything Theatre readers deciding whether they should catch The Other Room this October, how would you sum the show up in just three words?
“Surviving Isn’t Living” or “Funny, Heartbreaking, Honest”
Our thanks to the Ladybird team for their time. The Other Room will play at Lion and Unicorn Theatre from Tuesday 20 to Saturday 24 October as part of the HERE | FOR season.
