Spotlight On: Rachel Reddihough, Borderlines Outreach Project and Technical Manager

24th April 2020

We caught up with Rachel Reddihough, who works within our award-winning Borderlines programme, about how they are continuing to engage with their participants, and how she is staying positive during the current lockdown.

At the moment, Borderlines have ten live projects happening, working with individuals and groups facing challenges or at risk of being marginalised. You can read more about their life-changing work here.

Find out about Rachel’s fascinating role as Outreach Project and Technical Manager below…  

What does your role involve?

A bit of everything really! It can be anything from making sure we have space booked for groups at the theatre, to tour booking when we are going on the road, to lighting, sound, set, and costume designs. It is a really varied role and no days are the ever the same!

Talk us through a typical day…  

Before I officially worked here, I came for a taster day, and remember going home thinking what a crazy day that was, it can’t possibly always be like that… Ha! How wrong I was. These projects can mean that the Borderlines team are often scattered around the country and sometimes across the world.

If we are touring a show, then I will arrive at the theatre at about 7.30am, check we have everything and head over with the company to the venue. We set up and do our first performance at about 10.30am, and I will then run up to three workshops with the people who have seen it. Then I pack up and head back to the theatre at about 4pm, send the show reports and contact the venues for the next couple of days to make sure everything runs smoothly.

The workshop element of our performances is so important – often the pieces that they will see will be tackling important and difficult issues. Most recently we toured RESIST which was a Home Office funded project about community cohesion, racism, and extremism. The workshops offer the audience the time to process these themes and explore what their understanding and experiences of the world are in a safe environment.

How did you get into this role?

I have always been involved in theatre. All through school I was performing, and in fact still do occasionally. When the time came to choose what I wanted to do with my life, I was less keen on being on stage and preferred the more technical side. I went to Rose Bruford College and graduated in Lighting Design. For several years I was a freelancer, and took on stage management and design roles on small and medium scale touring. I then spent a few years at a theatre which staged lots of touring work, which involved a lot of heavy lifting, before coming to the New Vic.

What’s been your career highlight at the New Vic so far?

Working with Staffordshire Fire and Rescue and Staffordshire Police on Message Not Delivered. We wanted to create a film of what happens at the scene of an accident. Since the play was about using a mobile while driving we decided to do the filming on phones. This was also before we had professional actors with us, so I stood in as a casualty. With careful guidance and help from the fire service we managed to film the scenes with me being ‘cut out of the car’. The emergency services used this as a training opportunity, and it was an incredible experience, they do everything to make sure that you feel safe and looked after and are treated with dignity. Should you ever need them for real you will be in the safest hands! Road deaths are one of the biggest killers for young people. We toured this show several times and it has now been seen by nearly 10,000 young people, who will take away with them an important message about being safe on the road. You can see the short film on our YouTube channel here (please notes this drama is aimed at young people aged 13+ and features potentially distressing scenes).

Tell us something that people wouldn’t expect about your job role…

One of the most important things for me is to try and create the atmosphere of the New Vic while out on tour, because for a vast majority of our audience this may be the only experience of theatre that they have. It takes a lot of work to turn a school hall into a theatre space in an hour, but it is worth it. Theatre is for everyone and if this encourages people to experience theatre again then I will be happy!

Borderlines is focused on working with people who may not have had many opportunities in life, and this can take us far and wide, but all our projects start at home. Newcastle-under-Lyme, Stoke-on-Trent nd Staffordshire are unique in many ways however we share social issues with all areas of the country. The people that we work with get to share their experiences with communities across the world and find unique and exciting ways to make the world a better place.

How has your job changed while in lockdown and how are you engaging with Borderlines participants now?

Engaging with participants now brings new challenges, as the people that we work with through Borderlines often don’t have access to technology that others might take for granted. Access to computers and the internet is even more difficult now that many public services like libraries are closed. We are available for help and support for those who need it –  we’re sending out weekly emails to our groups, having fun reminiscing on Facebook, but for those without internet access we’re also keeping in contact with our groups with phone calls and messages, and letters in the post.

While we have had to reorganise a lot of events we were due to work on over the next few months, looking ahead, we’re very excited to continue work on our next Andrew Lloyd Webber musical theatre project. This will be an adaptation of Thursday’s Child by Noel Streatfeild! Many of the themes within Thursday’s Child will resonate with the young people we are working withIn the meantime, of course, the young people will be doing their own research by reading the book! And we look forward to sharing their work with you when we can.

How are you keeping yourself happy in lockdown?

I have horses, and this means that I get a few hours a day where I can be outside. We have strict times that we can go to the yard to comply with government guidelines. I also feel very lucky that I can still work, it gives me something to focus on and it’s great to stay in touch with our fabulous partners and participants. It’s great to be able to have a 4pm gin and tonic too!