creative portfolio

I was shortlisted for the Sky Arts Awards 2025 and an Offie finalist in 2026 for Transpose at the Barbican. I was a Jerwood Poetry Fellow 2021-22. My work has been staged at venues from the Barbican Centre to Glastonbury festival.

Shield
Verve Poetry Press
2021

"These are arresting, heart-stopping poems lit with a rare intensity. Hale’s poems don’t pull any punches, they explore what it is to live in a body and on the way touch the centre of the fragility deep inside all of us. Humane poems that will make you ache"

 Mona Arshi on Shield

poetry

The cover to Jamie Hale's shield. A surgical mask on a striped background.
The cover to Jamie Hale's shield. A surgical mask on a striped background.
read more of my poetry
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The starkness of these words stops me in my tracks. This is a poet with something to say and they’re saying it with art, craft, skill and raw shock.

Helena Nelson - Happenstance Press

Jamie is a poet, and a glorious poet, and I mean that he is literally a poet but he is also a poet in how he sees the world, and this is a beautiful, I think, piece, about how we look at death and how we look after each other and I really hope people enjoy it.

Jack Thorne - MacTaggart Lecture

★★★★★

"SUBVERSE is not comfortable – but my god, this type of work is necessary. To really understand what our siblings are facing, you must lose yourself in the singularity. Let sound, silhouette, and vibration dissolve assumptions and societal constructions. Few mediums can achieve that. In the dim light of the Pit, the work becomes a kind of séance – summoning pain, beauty, terror, and possibility. An extraordinary piece."

Vincent Jaskowski-Prowse – Attitude (Transpose: SUBVERSE 2025)

directing

Ila and Coda, bathed in blue light and shadow reach their arms up together, their gazes meeting
Ila and Coda, bathed in blue light and shadow reach their arms up together, their gazes meeting
Tatum sits on the floor looking away from the audience, bathed in a spotlight facing their bed
Tatum sits on the floor looking away from the audience, bathed in a spotlight facing their bed
Three figures on a stage, Evlyne seated, Anna stood, and Theo seated
Three figures on a stage, Evlyne seated, Anna stood, and Theo seated

Sophia Stefelle Photography - Transpose, Barbican Centre, 2025

Shona Louise Photography - The Acts, Bristol Old Vic 2025

Shona Louise Photography - The Acts, Barbican Centre, 2024

The importance of putting the power to represent disability and to self-define in the hands of those who know cannot be underestimated. This showcase is an excitingly creative, vital means of making that true.

Mary Pollard - Everything Theatre (The Acts 2024)

An evening in which sequences flow together, resulting in a 75-minute show that feels like a cohesive whole

Scott Matthewson - The Reviews Hub (Transpose 2025)

Multi-talented writer and theatre maker Jamie Hale has very rightly been recognised for his work and contributions to the arts. [...] A culmination of a year’s development programme, CRIPtic Arts present CRIPtic Pit Party, a powerful evening of sharing and performance.

Lucy Basaba - Theatre Full Stop (CRIPtic Pit Party 2021)

An anthology of pieces by disabled artists, The Acts by CRIPtic Arts takes the audience to the moon and back, thinks about the deconstructed nature of performance, explores the value of life and the legacy we leave behind.

The Reviews Hub (The Acts, 2024)

"Unashamedly loud and proud, Hale comes alive – and is indeed at his best – when he’s making comedy […] he takes command of the stage […] He’s clearly on the ascendant with last years’ Spread the Word award under his belt. He comes across as confident and full of potential as a writer and performer."

Colin Hambrook – Disability Arts Online on Quality of Life is Not a Measurable Outcome

performance

A person in pink scrubs pulls trousers off Jamie Hale, who sits in their wheelchair
A person in pink scrubs pulls trousers off Jamie Hale, who sits in their wheelchair
Jamie Hale sits in an electric wheelchair made up like a bed, hospital gown wings splayed out wide
Jamie Hale sits in an electric wheelchair made up like a bed, hospital gown wings splayed out wide
Soaked in blue light, Jamie Hale and CN Lester look at each other, surrounded by scaffolding
Soaked in blue light, Jamie Hale and CN Lester look at each other, surrounded by scaffolding

Shona Louise Photography - Quality of Life is Not a Measurable Outcome (promotional photography) 2024

Sophia Stefelle Photography - Frankenstein in Transpose at the Barbican, 2025

A compelling and witty performer who makes you laugh and reflect in equal measure

Agnes Carrington-Windo - Plays to See (Quality of Life is Not a Measurable Outcome)

A remarkable, fascinating interpretation of the work

Scott Matthewson - The Reviews Hub (Frankenstein)

Offie Award for Staging (Transpose)
Finalist, 2026

Sky Arts Awards for Theatre
Shortlisted, 2025

Genesis Future Directors
Longlisted, 2023

Shaw Trust Disability Power 100
Awarded, 2022-2024

Jerwood Poetry Fellowship
Awarded, 2021

Future Theatre Fund: Director/Theatremaker
Awarded, 2021

creative recognition
poetry cv

poetry

Founder and Judge, Disabled Poets’ Prize 2022-2024
Guest Editor, Modern Poetry in Translation
Shield (pamphlet), published by Verve Poetry Press
Bird Song, Zoeglossia
Fibrotic, UCL/Yale Poetry Prize
Furias Para Danzar, Magma
Faggot, Rialto
Arthurian Myth, Bedtime Stories for the End of the World
Lewisham / Harrow (with Daljit Nagra), Royal College of Literature

readings

Newcastle Poetry Festival
Arvon Foundation
University of Birmingham
Braidings, Oxford House (with Miss Jacqui and CN Lester)
University of Sheffield
UCL for UCL/Yale Poetry Prize


theatre cv

writing

  • I Want to Live, Theatre Royal Stratford East 2022

  • Quality of Life is Not A Measurable Outcome, HOME Manchester, Barbican Centre etc 2021-2025

  • Frankenstein, Transpose, Barbican Centre, 2025

directing

  • Romeo and Juliet R&D, various locations

  • The Acts, 2026, Old Vic, Bristol

  • Transpose 2025, Pit Party, Barbican Centre, London

  • Telepresence Residency 2024 with University of Brighton

  • The Acts, 2024, Barbican Centre, London

  • Self & Other, 2023, HOME, Manchester

  • The Crip Monologues, 2023, Camden People’s Theatre, London (curator)

  • The Crip Monologues, 2023, Bloomsbury Theatre, London

  • CRIPtic Pit Party, 2021, Barbican Centre, London

  • PostHuman, Rachel Gadsden, film and performance, UCL, London

performance

  • Frankenstein, Pit Party, Barbican Centre, London, 2025 (performer and librettist)

  • Quality of Life is Not a Measurable Outcome (formerly “NOT DYING”) (writer and performer) - Glastonbury 2025; Watford Palace Theatre, Watford, 2024; Roundhouse, London, 2024; Barbican, London, 2019; Lyric Hammersmith, London, 2019

  • Crip Monologues, Camden People’s Theatre, 2022

  • Welfare Counting, Live Art Development Agency 2021

  • Transpose, Barbican Centre, 2016 & 2017

commissions

  • I Want to Live, Theatre Royal Stratford East

  • Emerging Directors’ Guide, Unlimited

jamie hale

jamie@jamiehale.co.uk