A WRITER, PERFORMER AND THEATRE MAKER WITH A sweet tooth FOR THE RIDICULOUS.
A WRITER, PERFORMER AND THEATRE MAKER WITH A sweet tooth FOR THE RIDICULOUS.
Newcastle's answer to Elaine Stritch, Ginger Johnson, cut her teeth on the alt-drag and cabaret scenes of East London, where her unique blend of camp laughs and bareknuckle confessional earned her a reputation for being a risk-taking performer with a big heart and an even bigger mouth.
"A force to be reckoned with" - the Londonist
Since then, Johnson has become a fixture of the UK performance scene, playing to audiences including Southbank Centre, The Roundhouse, Birmingham Symphony Hall, Bristol Old Vic, CONTACT, The Hackney Empire and just about every major festival field you can think of. She is Associate Artist at Pleasance, writer and presenter on micro breakfast show 'Wakey!' and a resident host of Glastonbury Festival's infamous NYC Downlow.
"unforgettable to the core" - the upcoming
In 2014 she joined the ranks of legendary party-starters Sink The Pink as their in-house loudmouth and onstage emcee. She is also the creative force behind the collective's critically acclaimed theatre productions, 'Down The Rabbit Hole' and 'The Queen's Head' for Selfridges and later 'How to Catch a Krampus' and 'Escape from Planet Trash', which were written, directed and designed by Johnson and co-produced by Pleasance, London.
"Creative Mastermind" - Wonderland
In 2018 she collaborated with 68-year-old drag legend Lavinia Co-op to present 'Up Yours!', a tender reflection on queer life over the last half century. In the same year, Johnson created Glamorous Gran and Other Tall Stories', a collection of original stories for queer kids and their friends, adapted for the stage with the support of Southbank Centre. In 2019 her debut solo show 'Ginger Johnson's Happy Place' premiered at the Edinburgh fringe, where it was selected by The Times as one of the best shows of the festival.
"The new milennium's hope for equality, acceptance and empowerment" - Broadway Baby
As a theatre maker, Johnson creates surprising, thoughtful work that is concerned with embracing the absurdity of the human condition, developing a language of performance that subverts the expectations of her audience in a way that is both playful and sincere. Darkly comic and unapologetically honest, Johnson makes space to allow audiences to feel at ease with ideas that might otherwise be hard to swallow.
