Rosanna Mallinson

ROSANNA MALLINSON Director & Dramaturge

“For me theatre is about the electric, live connection between the audience and the actors, and the imaginative space they share for those few hours together. There is still an old magic in theatre. In this lonely digital age it is more and more important that we find time to be together again and dream together again.”

Rosanna has a playful, exploratory directing style with collaboration and innovative process at the core. She works with new writing and devising work, and is always searching for new projects with an urgent voice and boundary breaking new form. She values open mindedness, passion for craft and finding ways to bring theatre to new audiences.

Rosanna trained at Trinity College Dublin and at École Internationale de Théâtre Jaques Lecoq in Paris. She has directed over 30 productions and been the Artistic Director for two companies. She is a champion for stories which bring under-appreciated voices back into the conversation and an avid reader and writer of mysteries.

UPCOMING SHOWS

Against the subversive and glittering background of 1920s Berlin, one woman changed the world of animation and filmmaking forever.

Step into the captivating world of Lotte Reiniger, the visionary who created the very first feature-length animation film, ‘The Adventures of Prince Achmed’, a decade before Walt Disney’s ‘Snow White’. ‘The Animator’ brings to life this intrepid inventor and her eccentric team, as they build the first animation tables, seduce investors, fall in love and fight for their art form. Within this flickering world of shadows and light, Akimbo Theatre presents a high energy physical theatre biopic with dark political themes, holding an unsettling mirror to events today.

The Animator is playing at Winter Lights Festival (Norway) February 2026

AKIMBO THEATRE Ltd

Physical Theatre Company

Akimbo are a multi-award winning international physical theatre company co-founded by Rosanna Mallinsonand 6 others at l’École Internationale de Théâtre Jacques Lecoq in 2021. They make action-packed theatre that challenges social norms and plays with perspectives. Using an innovative creative language that blends razor sharp physicality, clown and martial arts, our work is like a comic book: violent, beautiful, funny and epic.

Their first show, ‘No One: The Invisible Man’ won the Young Peoples Choice Award at Showbox 2022 and has been touring for 11-18 year olds in Norway. Their most recent show ‘The Animator’ was at Southwark Playhouse Borough in 2025 and was made in development with Nordland Visual Theatre.

Reviews for Rosanna's Work

“ingeniously conjured… holds even the smallest children spellbound”

“Cleverly blending local historical fact with fiction… the innovative theatrical/interactive murder mystery format is engaging… a hugely enjoyable way to spend an evening”

“subtle, ingenious, quietly satisfying and insidiously memorable”

“disorienting, nightmarish and incredibly compelling piece of theater that will give you shivers as you leave the auditorium”

"tightly plotted, gripping and excellently directed - cannot be recommended too highly"

"This has everything, humor, depth, gravity defying fight scenes - simply flawless"

"Sensational"

"Quick, slick and endlessly inventive"

OFFIES - CRITICS CHOICE

THE ANIMATOR - SOUTHWARK PLAYHOUSE

YOUNG PERSONS CHOICE AWARD

NO ONE - SHOWBOX

DRAMATURGY

Creation and Clarification

Rosanna is a dramaturge with 13 years experience in writing, directing and devising. She has been the dramaturge for a number of shows, from micro-cinema puppetry at Edinburgh Fringe to a multi-media Hip Hop dance shows at Sadlers Wells. If you are looking for support to bring your vision to life then please send me an email and let me know about your project, whatever stage of development you are at.

PLAYING WITH NEW TECHNOLOGY

Rosanna’s projects often explore the exciting new possibilities that technology can bring to theatre, providing new platforms to reach new audiences and new forms of expression. These include live streaming animation, audio immersive experiences and interactive online shows about the dangers of performing for social media. Below is a link to an immersive show you can experience with any nearby tree: ‘As Natural As Photosynthesis’ by the novelist Naomi Ishiguro. Just find a friend, put on headphones together, sync up and experience life as a trees reborn.

As Natural As Photosynthesis

Written by Naomi Ishiguro

Music composed by Richard Durning

Performed by Felix Trench

Performed at Music Festivals including Brainchild & All Together Now

Blood Will Have Blood (extract)

Written by Cecil Fenn

Music composed by Nicola Chang

Performed by Dan Buckley

Funded by Arts Council England for touring to non-traditional spaces.

PLAYING WITH AUDIENCES

Rosanna was the artistic director and writer for immersive and site-specific company, ImmerCity. The driving force behind the work was reaching non-traditional theatre audiences who were excited by being able to explore and interact with a space, rather than being passive observers.

Over ten years, she wrote and directed over twenty projects, including the incredibly successful Immersive Mystery series. These shows took over a unique historical location and developed a story that brought to life true events and themes that resonated with what was happening today. It increased peoples engagement with local monuments and cultural spaces, like libraries, museums, churches and even the clocktower in Kings Cross.

She also created interactive corporate events for companies like Jo Malone, Weddings at Wilton’s Music Hall and haunted ghost walks for Opera Holland Park.

If you click the link below you can see the hundreds of five star reviews left by fans over the years.

“I am interested in work that explores how theatre can be a uniquely present event, bringing people together in an experience. For me a show is about the audiences journey. In immersive theatre their journey is driven by their curiosity and learning how to peak that is the key.”