About The Company
Chain Reaction Theatre Company started life in 1993 as a project initiated by Studio 3 Arts, a community arts organisation based in the London Borough of Barking & Dagenham. The project aimed to discourage young women from smoking and was funded by the Barking & Havering Family Health Services Authority (FHSA). Seven young female students studying Performing Arts at Barking College were chosen to write and perform a piece of theatre which aimed to provide young people with accurate information about smoking.
The performance was called Chain Reaction.
The original intention was a one-off tour to schools and youth centres in the London Borough of Barking & Dagenham but, due to the phenomenal success of the show, the group of actresses began touring the show across other London boroughs.
In 1994 Sarah Choppen and two of the other actresses involved in the project decided to establish Chain Reaction as a professional theatre company. Motivated by a huge passion for making a positive change to people’s lives, they set about using theatre to communicate important messages about personal, social and health issues… Chain Reaction Theatre Company was officially born!
During this year the company received its first commission – to develop a drugs awareness production as part of the European Drug Prevention Week, funded by the Barking, Havering & Brentwood Healthcare Trust. This piece of theatre was called Know Your Mind and is still one of the company’s best loved educational productions.
Due to the success of these projects, in 1996 we received funding from London Arts Board to devise Inside Out, our sexual health awareness show. Since this date we have developed a strong repertoire of twelve educational theatre projects on current issues that affect young people and have gained an outstanding reputation for delivering effective engaging issue-based workshops to young people, including young offenders and those who are considered ‘at risk’ of disengaging from society. We have also become extremely successful developing mainstream theatre projects for adults, training videos for corporate companies and issue-based theatre productions for the public and private sector.
Delivering inspirational theatre projects to young people in disadvantaged areas remains at the heart of what we do. Our projects help young people become more knowledgeable about the health and social issues that really affect them; more able to make positive informed choices; engage (often for the first time) in the arts; and grow in skills, motivation, self-esteem and confidence.
Our passion, energy and enthusiasm are still as strong as ever, and, with a wealth of skills and experience behind us, we continue to take our projects to schools, educational establishments, community venues, theatres and youth centres with outstanding results.
When Chain Reaction started over a decade and a half ago, we never envisaged that we would reach so many young people and help make so many amazing changes to the communities that we grew up in. But since our conception in 1994, we are proud to say we have worked with over 300,000 young people – that’s more than a quarter of a million young people who have felt the positive effects of our work!
