Creative Portfolio

I work as a multi-disciplinary creative, with a range of current projects in my creative portfolio. You can find examples of my work on my publications and poems pages or by buying Shield, read about my performances or learn more about my work on my reviews and press pages.

The cover to Jamie's poetry book, Shield. The image is made up of six horizontal stripes. The outside ones are white, and inside it goes yellow, pink, navy, turquoise (top to bottom). On the top white band in green it says "Jamie Hale" centrally with "Shield" in pink next to that. There is a white mask across the coloured bands. At the bottom on the white band it says "Verve Poetry Press" in pink
The picture has a dark background with white pinpricks that are stars. Jamie is lying in a hospital bed, bathed in piunk and blue light.
Jamie with a red beard, glasses, and lipstick, wearing green eyeshadow and a silver jacket, clearly performing

I do:

Screenwriting

I am currently writing an original series for Channel 4, with Gaumont, about a trans man coming to terms with his past. I also have three other projects in development – an adaption of my solo show, NOT DYING, for television, a romcom about a queer, disabled couple (with Hayleigh Barclay), and a series about genetic inheritance, with an anti-tragic approach to progressive disability.

Poetry

Shield

One of the three Jerwood Poetry Fellows in 2021-2022 and a previous London Writers’ Awards winner, my first poetry pamphlet, Shield was published in January 2021. With thanks to the Jerwood Fellowship, I am currently working on my first full collection.

‘These are arresting, heart-stopping poems lit with a rare intensity. Hale’s poems don’t pull any punches, they explore what it is to live in a body and on the way touch the centre of the fragility deep inside all of us. Humane poems that will make you ache.’ 

– Mona Arshi
A white wall with text "I wish to be held by a river please i wish to be held by a river please drowning is something i do at night waking choked only reminds me that air is precious i wish to be empty a river knows the void, carves it day on glimmering day months later her path has changed i wish for rounded stones my edges are raw and sharp i wish for this not to end for me i wish to be free i wish for a dream woven of reeds with which to sail the rivers please i wish to remember this wish when i am floating in confusing seas i wish to come safe to land then leave i wish to be floating forever please"
I wish to be held by a river please by Jamie Hale
Painted at the Newbridge Project as part of Bordered Belonging by Bhavani Esapathi at the NewBridge Project
Photo credit to Matt Denham

NOT DYING

Also known as ‘Quality of Life is not a Measurable Outcome’

NOT DYING – solo poetry, narrative storytelling and comedy show

WATCH TRAILER

Winning the Evening Standard Future Theatre Fund Award for Directing & Theatremaking, and shortlisted for Best Spoken Word Show in the Saboteur Awards 2021, NOT DYING is my solo poetry and spoken-word show, combining poetry, comedy, narrative storytelling and drama. It has currently been redeveloped, directed by Athena Stevens, and is available for performance from Autumn 2022 onwards.

“an acerbically funny and deeply thought-provoking monologue […] Hale is a compelling and witty performer who makes you laugh and reflect in equal measure” – Agnes Carrington-Windo, Plays to See

CRIPtic Arts

Founded by myself in 2019, CRIPtic Arts is an Arts Council England-funded support, development, production, and showcasing organisation for work by and for deaf and disabled people in the arts. We offer year-round workshops, mentoring, training, and development, and a biannual showcase.

Previously…

Other work in my creative portfolio has included:

  • Directing Self & Other at HOME Manchester 2024
  • Dramaturgy and project creation for Crip Monologues 2023-24
  • Founder and Director of Disabled Poets Prize (2023 and 2024)
  • Residency at Mayking Space, Bristol, for Quality of Life is not a Measurable Outcome
  • Writer and performer, I Want To Live, Theatre Royal Stratford East 2022
  • Guest Editor, Modern Poetry in Translation, 2022
  • Curating the CRIPtic 2021 programme, and directing the showcase at the Barbican Centre 2021
  • Curating and leading the CRIPtic x Spread the Word writing salons for d/Deaf and disabled writers
  • CRIPtic x Spread the Word online writing retreat for d/Deaf and disabled writers, 2021
  • When We Got Sick monologue commission for Graeae’s Crips Without Constraints
  • Experimental – an online writing retreat for d/Deaf and disabled writers, 2020
  • Art, Activism and Access, a series of articles for the Wellcome Trust, 2020
  • CRIPtic Pit Party 2019 at the Barbican Centre
  • Writers Room – KAOS by Charlie Covell for Netflix, 2019
  • Barbican OpenLab residency 2018
  • Invisible Fest performance, 2018, Rich Mix
  • Transpose performances in 2017 & 2018 at the Barbican Centre
  • London Writers’ Awards for Poetry, 2018 (including performance at the South Bank Centre)
  • Shape Arts showcase, Tate Modern, 2018
  • Saboteur Awards showcase, 2018

More can be found here