Perfect Show for Rachel
Barbican - Nov 2022
Zoo Co Theatre
Lighting, Video, and Creative Captions
PSFR is a show orchestrated by director Rachel O'Mahony, a learning disabled care-home resident, who uses a custom-built tech desk designed by Rachel Sampley. The desk is able to trigger lighting, video, projections, and sound sequences in a non-linear fashion; giving Rachel O'Mahony agency and control over the performance. This tied together a total of thirty-nine custom buttons, five computers, three projectors, one live camera feed, four screens, and a lighting desk.
Zoo Co received The Oxford Samuel Beckett Theatre Trust Award.
Perfect Show for Rachel won the Off West End Award for Access.
★★★★★
"Why can’t more theatre be like this? Open, relaxed, fun and full of love"
-The Guardian
★★★★
'a joyous piece of anarchic knockabout fun'
-The Stage
Patent Pending
Part of Unscene - Oct 2022
Stanley Arts
Lighting, Video, and Creative Captions
Unscene was an immersive installation connecting the work of five individual artists from different disciplines. Patent Pending was an ethereal installation containing animation, creative typography, curated interactive props, and whimsical surreal poetry. Rachel wrote, designed, and narrated the piece.
Supported by The Heritage Fund.
Barrier(s)
July 2022
The National - The Dorfman
Video and Creative Captions
Director: Lucy Jane Atkinson
Associate Director: Paula Garfield
Barrier(s) was the recipient of The New Views 2022 competition. Written by Eloise Pennycott, the play tells a dystopian future of two queer women, one deaf and one hearing, as they navigate a whole where sign language becomes illegal.
The Great Gatsby
2017-2023
Upcoming; Theatre Clywd, Wales
Previous: London; York; Harrogate; Seoul, Koera
Lighting
The Great Gatsby is the longest-running immersive show in the UK. Rachel joined the production in 2017 as its first lighting designer and is still with the London production and will be designing the co production with Theatre Clywd.
★★★★
"strong lighting design from Rachel Sampley"
-The Stage
★★★★
"Rachel Sampley’s lighting works gorgeous effects, by turns frenetic and moody...capturing the colourful mania of Gatsby’s parties"
-The Guardian
Follow the Signs
August 2022
Soho Theatre
Video and Creative Captions
Director: Harry Jardine
Follow the Signs is an autobiographical hip hop gig theatre piece containing rap, dance, visual vernacular, and BSL by Chris Fonseca.
★★★
'It is definitive proof that we need many more stories exploring the themes that Fonseca so charismatically raises.'
-The Guardian
★★★★
Deaf dancer Chris Fonseca’s play is poppy, punchy and personal
-Liam O'Dell
Rise of the Refrain
Sept 2021
Stanley Arts
Lighting, Video, and Creative Captions
Rise of the Refrain was written and performed by Liv Wynter, asks what happens when a Greek chorus goes on strike.
The show featured a live punk band and is performed in spoken word, integrated BSL performed by lead performer Alexandra James, and creative captioning.
The video design combined found footage, filmed content, and custom 2d animations. All the content and captions were carefully spread across eight screens and one rear projector.
Chemistry
October 2019
The Finborough
Lighting
Directed by Alex Howarth
With dark humour, a beautiful soundtrack and captivating visuals, Chemistry is an intimate, frank and uncompromising examination of the chemicals we take and how they impact our ability to love.
★★★★★
As my eyes adjusted, I took in the steel frame around the stage with a tangle of wires and lights underneath: a neural web. The set, sound, and lighting are almost a third character in this immaculate production.
UK Theatre Web 3/11/19
★★★★
“Carefully paced and lit with considerable care by Rachel Sampley.”
Maryam Philpott, The Reviews Hub
★★★★
“Rachel Sampley’s stylish lighting turns the dense smoke in the room into an ambient force that alternates between the dreamy and the nightmarish.”
Mert Dilek, The Stage
★★★★
“Rachel Sampley's beautiful and atmospheric lighting design.”
Amy Mawer, The Crumb