Rhianna Ilube is a playwright, event curator and dramaturg from London. Her debut play, Samuel Takes A Break..., premiered at The Yard Theatre in London in Spring 2024, was a finalist for the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, Soho Theatre’s Verity Bargate Award, and shortlisted for the Women’s Prize for Playwriting. Her second show, 1884, premiered at Shoreditch Town Hall and Brighton Festival in April 2024. Ilube is also a member of Soho Theatre’s ‘Soho Six’, where she is now developing a new play. She was previously associate director for Coney, an award-winning interactive theatre company working across the UK, and she is a film programmer for BFI Flare, Europe’s biggest LGBTQIA+ film festival.
At MacDowell in 2024, Rhianna worked on a draft of a new play exploring the story of St. Bernadette Soubirous, widespread Marian apparitions across time and space, queer Catholic nostalgia, and the politics of the Catholic Church.
Portrait by Becky Mursell
