Writer: Bryony Kimmings
Directors: Bryony Kimmings and Francesca Murray-Fuentes
Bryony Kimmings is a townie. And yet, after getting together with her friend (and now partner) Will Duke, she committed to being all-in on a move from Brighton into rural East Sussex with her son and his daughter. Would the move fill the emptiness she feels inside, her “soul hole”?
And thus begins Kimmings’s latest autobiographical show, Bog Witch. At first, it promises to be the opposite of some of her more recent work (“mental breakdowns, drowning, and ill babies,” she quips). Kimmings’s descriptions of her new environment are filled with incredulous descriptions of the people in her new circle. Chief among these is Aster, a hippie whose home Kimmings describes as “a hobbit’s vagina”, and who encourages the newcomer to embrace man’s destructive relationship with nature.
Aster has just returned from something she calls the “Council of All Beings”, an annual communal event in which most people take on the role of elements of the natural ecosystem that normally have no voice, through which they interrogate a person who stands as proxy for the human race. Signing Kimmings up for the same event for the following year gives Bog Witch a solid timeframe of a calendar year in which Kimmings and her relationship to nature and the climate crisis are examined in some of the most entertaining ways.
The contrast between the way she has been living and the manner in which her world has changed forms the backbone of Kimmings’s comedy in the piece. From realising just how many air miles have been taken up by the ingredients of one supermarket sandwich, to lapsing into an EDM-driven daydream whenever her boyfriend starts talking about the environment, we witness someone who has a willingness to engage but finds the pull of the commercialised, plastic-loving world remains as strong as ever.
Slowly, though, we see a mellowing. The most illustrative change occurs when she discovers that the oak tree she wants to cut down to improve the view from her writing desk is at the heart of a vibrant ecosystem, not only for the thousands of species that live in its branches but for all the natural world beyond its canopy. Originally planted to provide wood for the dilapidated farmhouse where Kimmings and her family live, “Mother Oak” has become an integral part of the environment, and cutting it down would have devastating consequences.
As the seasons change, illuminated by Duke’s projections and Tom Parkinson’s compositions, Kimmings’s wardrobe changes too, her increasing embrace of “cottagecore” clothing symbolising her softening stance. But still, she cannot let go: from purchasing plastic decorations for Halloween, or struggling to answer her young son when he learns that his mother (and her generation, but mostly her, it seems) has been destroying the climate, there are signs that Kimmings will never quite be the eco-warrior her partner is, that EDM daydream barely ever out of reach.
While Kimmings is keen to make the whole show feel light, its autobiographical nature brings us into some of her darkness, too. An unexpected pregnancy and even more unexpected miscarriage remind us that darkness is never far away.
Kimmings ends the show with, as Aster wanted, a meeting of the Council of All Beings. Some inspired audience participation fills out the stage, helped by Tom Rogers’s design and some beautiful mask work. It provides a resolution of sorts for Kimmings’s grief: it also helps us appreciate that, like Mother Oak, our effects extend beyond our physical branches.
While Bog Witch’s masterful storytelling has its roots in the climate crisis, it rejects any lecturing stance just as firmly as it lovingly mocks people who go all-in on living in harmony with nature. Like Kimmings, we are messy, sometimes tortured souls, preferring the EDM daydream instead of facing up to our ecological responsibilities. But maybe there are better ways to live and thrive; to nurture Mother Oak instead of cutting it down for a better view.
Runs until 25 October 2025
