The Incubator is the egg’s idea development programme.

It has one function – putting brilliant plays in front of audiences.

How does it work?

Our aim is to deepen the quality of art that is available for young people, and to inspire our theatre makers to think about children and their place in our society differently. We hope we do this by giving artists space, time and support to think and conceive.

We don’t believe in Artist Development. Now, of course, we’re being disingenuous, because we do believe in artists very much. But we think that the best gift we can give an artist is a paying audience. And for them to learn. And then, for the organisation to reinvest in the artist. And for that artist to learn again. And learn. And again.

We believe there is only one way you can develop as an artist. To work. To be invited to make plays by people like us.

We don’t look for emerging or established artists in particular. We are passionate about good, new, original ideas. Therefore, we’re drawn to voices that are unheard, stories that are untold, people who are not represented. We need new people, telling new stories, in new ways.

Like a lot of people, our budgets start on £0. We have no producing budget. We duck, dive, and scrabble around looking for money both earned and fundraised.  Every time we produce we start from scratch, because we are led by the idea. We are led by the drive, hunger and passion to realise a single idea at a moment in time.

Therefore, our artist support is tailored to meet the requirements of the idea we are developing. We hold artists by giving them the space – time, money and resources – to develop their idea.

An artist’s time with us often starts with the establishing of their lines of enquiry – their ideas, their big ambitions, the nagging questions or pieces of research that they’ve wanted to explore in order to realise their ideas. They receive an egg journal with which to begin their doodling. What follows next is weeks, months of supported exploration and research. We provide artists with test audiences, match them with partners , read scripts, give them space, the staff, and as many resources as we can to support the development, deepening and realisation of their ideas. Artists can disappear down rabbit holes, make mistakes, make glorious discoveries. We put Incubator artists in contact with as many people as they can who might aid their research. And prod their thinking. Artists are exposed to high quality work, often in festival settings, and expert-led critical analysis. We try to de-clutter artists of all the baggage that gets in the way. Through rigorous questioning and debate, identifying of mentors, experts, academics and, wherever possible people who don’t work in theatre, we help artists reach the hinterland of their idea.

We want to alleviate the pressure of target driven activity. We want to take a step back and view the world (and our own practice) differently. Experience the unexpected.

An Incubator Mentor, David Harradine, once said to us that ‘a thing needs to be a thing in order to be a thing.’ Well, once the idea has been developed into a thing (which may or may not be the final thing it ends up as), we ask artists to bring the fruits of their labour to the Incubator showcase. There, they share their work with an invited audience who might have a hand in whatever happens next. We don’t ask that this work is finished, complete, or perfect. We do ask that this work celebrates artists’ big ideas.  It may be a scratch. It may be a presentation. It may be something entirely different that we haven’t thought of yet.