First female partnership team set to leave theatre

THE FIRST female partnership team to run a London theatre have announced their departure from the Donmar Warehouse.

Josie Rourke became the venue’s artistic director in 2012, along with Kate Pakenham as executive producer.

Rourke will end her tenure in 2019 ahead of Pakenham, who will depart in June this year.

During the pair’s time at the helm of the not-for-profit theatre, they have overseen productions including The Vote, which starred Dame Judi Dench, Coriolanus with Tom Hiddleston and an allfemale Shakespeare Trilogy directed by Phyllida Lloyd.

Rourke and Pakenham won an Olivier Award for Rourke’s revival of musical City of Angels in 2014, and in 2016 they doubled the Donmar Warehouse’s roster by introducing plays in its Covent Garden venue as well as in King’s Cross and New York.

The Donmar Warehouse said that, during their leadership, half of the directors and actors involved in its productions have been women.

Rourke said: “Leading the Donmar is one of the great privileges of London theatre, and doing so in partnership with Kate Pakenham has been one of the great joys. I am so grateful for the chance to have brought new plays, new audiences and new talent to its stage.

“I was proud to be the first woman director to run a major London theatre, but I’m even prouder that the landscape has now changed beyond recognition, and forever.”