Rubie, Nina Scott and Polly Rowley-Sams as The Musical Spores / Photo by Tegid Cartwright
Photo by Tegid Cartwright
Nina (they/them) is a political theatre maker, musician, performer and educator based in Glasgow. Their work is celebratory, immersive and collaborative, exploring different creative tools for social change.
Nina is Director, Co-Writer & ensemble performer of Be More Mushroom, a raucous, educational musical for kids and grown ups exploring what fungi can teach us about identity, power and society. Be More Mushroom was developed as part of a residency at St. Margaret's House with Dan de la Motte and a group of queer performers, musicians and mycologists. It was recently performed at Queer Nature: After Hours at Kew Gardens and will be developed further in 2024. Alongside the show is multiple workshops for all ages creatively engaging with Queer Theory and Fungi.
Nina has been interviewed about Be More Mushroom for Mushroom People 2 (Fall 2024). You can buy this gorgeous magazine for mycophiles here.
Nina is an experienced educator and facilitator. They currently lecture on the BA Theatre for Social Change course at Rose Bruford Drama School, teaching Creative Campaigning and Producing in Practice. Nina regularly works in Catalonia with ULEX, co-designing and delivering courses for activists across Europe including: 'Theatre of the Oppressed' (Nov 2023) 'Integral Activist Training' (Oct 2024, 2023 & 2022) and 'Creative Tools for Social Change' (April 2022).
Alongside Emer Mary Morris, Nina was Artistic Director of You Should see the Other Guy Theatre (2014-2022), a London based grassroots collective made up of queer and women artists which worked on and off stage to tackle housing injustice. Nina has Co-produced, written and directed YSSTOG's Land of the Three Towers (Camden People's Theatre 2015-2019), a series of verbatim musicals which were performed on London housing estates. The plays share different methods of resisting gentrification and regeneration. The script of Land of the Three Towers: Vol I has been published in Radical Housing: Art Struggle and Care (ed, Ana Valencia, 2021) which can be downloaded and ordered here.
Nina's baby (pun intended) is Womb with a View (WINNER Best Festival Venue, Independent Association of Festivals Award, 2017, WINNER Shambala micro-venues competition 2016), an immersive venue which gives birth to new ideas and an interactive performance which gives birth to YOU. The womb sets out to queer narratives of wombs, childbirth and parenthood. In 2021 Nina received Developing Your Creative Practice Funding to develop Womb with a View, exploring queering trans healthcare and telling the story of birth through cabaret, song and silliness.
Nina has designed celebrated costumes for award winning companies including Kill the Beast's He Had Hairy Hands (WINNER Peter Brook Festival Award, WINNER Manchester Theatre Awards, BBC Top Pick of the Fringe) and The Boy Who Kicked Pigs.
A core part of Nina's practice is singing and song-making and they are a long standing member of queer choral collective F*Choir. They sing and play bass in Rubie.
LAND OF THE THREE TOWERS (2016)
YOU SHOULD SEE THE OTHER GUY
Directors and Writers: Nina Scott and Emer Morris
Ensemble: Sophie Williams, CJ Hutchinson, Saphire Macintosh, Maria Hunter. Lotte Rice, Grace Surrey
Ruby Wilde, Jennifer Daily
Land of the ThreeTowers has been published in Radical Housing: Art, Struggle, Care (Journal ed. Ana Valencia).
‘‘From a new generation of thinkers who have, in this inaugural work, taken theatre in a whole new direction.’’ ***** International Times