Date of Interview: 12 September 2025
Interviewer: Shirley Jamil
Interviewee: Elaine Wong
ELAINE WONG
Hi, my name is Elaine Wong. So I first came across New Earth Theatre when I was at university, so a long time ago now. And this is when Kumiko was working across education and community. So the initiative that I was working on when I joined is now, I believe, now called New Earth Academy.
So at the time it was focusing on new entrants to training for acting specifically, but I believe now it incorporates a lot more things like directing, writing as well. So this is kind of in the very early days. So there was a drama school at the time called ALRA. So we were running a lot of programmes. Actually, NO I think it pre-dates ALRA. I think it was actually the Central School of Speech and Drama actually, even before then. So this sort of very early kind of workshops that we were doing. So this is in the summer. So I was helping as an education associate. So I was doing a lot of the marketing around that. I was helping kind of run a lot of the events back then. So I did that first for a few months, and then after I finished university, I got to know the team at New Earth very well, and so I stayed on for a few years in a kind of more of a community capacity.
And then I moved on to start to do a lot of the photography for them, for their community events. So things like if they had kind of new play readings, and I remember I did a lot of those over the years and a lot of the New Earth academy events as well for actor training, kind of those showcases. So I was heavily involved in a lot of community work during that time. Yeah. So that was kind of the early days of how I was involved in New Earth Theatre.
SHIRLEY JAMIL
Did they contact you or did you find them first?
ELAINE WONG
It’s a good question. I can’t remember. It was actually it was that long ago that I can’t quite remember. I would like to say that they had something on their website and I saw it and I applied. Yeah, that is my memory. But it was a long time ago, so it’s hard to remember. Exactly.
SHIRLEY JAMIL
So how long will you say? A long time ago. What year are you looking at?
ELAINE WONG
I can’t remember exactly. I’d have to go back into the archives, but I believe it was around kind of 2010, roughly. So from now, around fifteen years ago. Hence the memory is a little bit hazy after fifteen years.
SHIRLEY JAMIL
Okay. That’s great. Have you witnessed or experienced a shift in the industry because of the work New Earth has done?
ELAINE WONG
Absolutely. I mean, this is part of the reason why I’m not so involved in it anymore. Like, I feel like in the early days, we’re such a small team. We’re trying to do so much, whereas now it’s so established now that, yeah, I just, all I do is kind of go get invited to things and I go along occasionally. But yeah, it’s a completely different landscape. I really feel strongly that newer theatre and the team from the original founding five members of Yellow Theatre to all the artistic directors and they’ve had over the years, these people have really championed and kind of led the way in change. So absolutely, the landscape has changed significantly and for the better.
SHIRLEY JAMIL
Is there anything in particular you’d like to tell me or you’d like to speak about New Earth, Yellow Earth, about? I mean, you’ve gone through quite a bit now. Where are you now? Explain to us where you are now.
ELAINE WONG
Yes, I can definitely talk about that. So when I was in my final year of university for my undergraduate, I studied fine art. But I took a lot of film and theatre studies modules, hence why I wanted to work with theatre companies.
So after I graduated, I felt that I wanted to work a lot more with theatre companies, hence why I kind of got in touch and kind of did some work, community and outreach. And then also I did during that time a lot of playwriting as well. It wasn’t with New Earth Theatre, it was through Royal Court and then Soho Theatre a little bit later on that I was exploring playwriting. So my roots were very much theatre. And then after that I decided actually that I was much more interested in a wider screen and creative industry. So theatre was, my first love I always say to people is theatre, and I go to theatre so all the time. But in terms of what I engage with, kind of for career wise, it’s been less so for theatre. But I have fond memories of my time. When I did.
So I began working a lot more in the film industry after my time with New Earth Theatre. So I was at the BFI, the British Film Institute, for a long time after that, working specifically in the London Film Festival team. So I was a film programmer for many years and also worked in the events team there. And then from there I decided to size up over to video games. I’ve been working in the games industry now for a few years as well, so my career has kind of transitioned across all these kinds of creative industries, but still working, very proud to stay in the creative industries and hopefully will do so for many more years.
SHIRLEY JAMIL
If you were to leave a message to someone who’s going to discover New Earth for the first time, what would you say?
ELAINE WONG
Oh, that’s not an easy question. I’ll do two parts. The first one would be for someone who kind of like myself, were starting out in the industry and wanting to explore, you know, thinking about working professionally in the industry. I would say New Earth Theatre for my experience a long time ago was very revolutionary. And this is not just the team back then, when I always engage with the team now, are just very, very open, a very approachable company to work with. There’s lots of different initiatives so you can get involved with and yeah, as I said before, like community is there. Like I said, you’re not just talking to one person or a small team. There’s a whole network there that you will reach when you engage with New Earth Theatre. I think that’s always going to have been the lifeblood of New Earth, is that it’s a kind of connection and also very obviously the East Asian connection as well. And the British East Asian, it’s like it’s so important you don’t have that with other theatres. I think New Earth is quite unique in that way. It’s always been able to bring together community.
And then the second part of the message is someone who has an audience, if they’ve never heard of a theatre production from New Earth Theatre, I would say I was. I’ve seen quite a lot of their shows over the years. I would say that they create something that’s very different. What they’ve always done well is toured the shows as well. Every show that they produce is so, so different, but in a great way. You know, they’re not, they don’t want to just kind of work with one specific type of writer or one type of story. There’s just so much. You know, they’ve done children’s theatre over the years. They’ve taken stories from across East Asia, from the diaspora as well. So it doesn’t matter where you are in the UK, if you are looking for a theatre company that is very exciting and kind of bring new perspectives, I would say go see a New Earth Theatre production, I would say.