Walkern, 1712. England has been free from witch-hunts for decades until Jane Wenham is blamed for a tragic death and charged with witchcraft. A terrifying ordeal begins, as the village is torn between those who want to save Jane's life and those who claim they want to save her soul.
Inspired by events in a Hertfordshire village, the play explores sex and society's hunger to find and create witches.
Rebecca Lenkiewicz's Jane Wenham: The Witch of Walkern premiered at Watford Palace Theatre before going on UK tour in September 2015, in an Out of Joint, Watford Palace Theatre and Arcola Theatre co-production, in association with Eastern Angles.
Rebecca Lenkiewicz's plays include The Night Season (National Theatre, Critics' Circle's Most Promising Playwright Award, 2004) and Her Naked Skin (National Theatre, 2008), which was the first play by a living female playwright to be staged on the Olivier stage. Other plays include The Invisible (The Bush), Jane Wenham, Soho, The Painter (Arcola), The Typist (Riverside Studios), The Lioness (Tricycle), That Almost Unnameable Lust, Shoreditch Madonna, Blue Moon over Poplar (Soho Theatre), A Soldier's Tale (Old Vic), Invisible Mountains (National Theatre), Faeries (Royal Opera House), Justitia (Peacock Theatre), and adaptations of Ibsen's Ghosts (Arcola) and James's The Turn of the Screw (Almeida). Film includes Colette, Disobedience and Ida, co-written with Pawel Pawlikowski, which won a BAFTA and the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film, 2015.
