Internationalist Theatre is a London theatre company founded by South African Greek actress Angelique Rockas in September 1980.[1] The company was originally named New Internationalist Theatre,[2][3] with an intention to pursue an internationalist approach in its choice of plays as well as "a multi-racial drama policy, with an even mix of performers drawn from different cultural groups", The Stage, April 1981.[1][4]
The theatre has received coverage from stage papers around the world.[5][6][7][8][9] It received charity status in 1986.[10]
The Internationalist Theatre has put on plays by Jean Genet (The Balcony),[11] Griselda Gambaro (The Camp),[12][13][14] Brecht (Mother Courage and Her Children),[15][16] Luigi Pirandello (Liolà),[17][18][19] Tennessee Williams (In the Bar of a Tokyo Hotel),[20][21] August Strindberg (Miss Julie)[22] and Maxim Gorky (Enemies).[23] Their critical reception was generally favourable,[11][24][20][25][26][27] although not universally. Time Out magazine disliked their production of Mother Courage: "the casting only inspires a whole host of irreverent questions: what on earth, say, is an American sergeant doing in seventeenth century Europe? And how did a Pakistani chaplain get into the Swedish army?" [28] an example of the resistance to diversity casting at this point of time to a theatre first of a multi-racial Mother Courage production. The Pakistani actor referred to by Malcolm Hay was the veteran Asian Parsi actor Renu Setna. The Financial Times found Liolà`s multi-national casting problematic: "do we really need this peculiar medley of Italian accents for the English premiere? The problem is compounded by the commitment ... to a multi-national cast ... English, German, Sicilian, and Italian actors produce widely differing versions of the Latin lilt"[29]