Current projects as Dramaturg:
Unfortunate: The Untold Story of Ursula the Sea Witch by Robyn Grant, Daniel Foxx and Tim Gilvin
Lovestuck by James Cooper (premiere Theatre Royal Stratford East, June 2025)
Thrive: Be the Architect of your own Health and Happiness by Dr Rangan Chatterjee. UK Tour 2025
Ongoing dramaturgy with Balich Wonder Studio and Cirque du Soleil, writing and creating concepts for large scale theme park and location based entertainment projects.
Lightning Boy by Charlie Turner and Liv Warden
Stagshaw Fayre by Kitty Morgan
The Unstoppable Letty Pegg by Helen Arney and James Hughes
The Grind by Michelle Payne
My Dog Has Fleas by Vikki Stone
.. And the Winner Is by Elliot Clay and Hayley Doyle
Kate is an experienced consultant and dramaturg, particularly in the field of new musicals. She has over twenty years of experience in understanding how stories and audiences work, and is very proud of the nickname ‘Fairy Godmother of New Musicals’ (thanks Spitlip!)
The role of a dramaturg can differ from one project to another, depending on the needs of the team and the production timeline, but essentially a dramaturg provides and implements the support that a writer or writing team might need during the writing process. The collaboration can include inputting into story lining, researching, song spotting, questioning, advising on tone or structure and most importantly providing a consistent and focused outside eye and ear to aid the writers to work at their best.
A consulting relationship can include suggesting writers and putting a team together, supporting the conceptualising of a new project, creating timelines and draft deadlines, weekly or fortnightly catch up meetings, providing a sounding board for ideas, reading and feeding back on drafts, arranging a reading with a team of actors.
Writer collaborations include:
Tony Robinson
Vikki Stone
Sonali Bhattacharyya
Michelle Payne
Robyn Grant, Daniel Foxx and Tim Gilvin
James Cooper, Bryn Christopher and Martin Batchalor
Kitty Morgan
Charlie Turner and Liv Warden
Scott Gilmour and Claire McKenzie aka Noisemaker
Henry Roadnight and Adam Johnson
Alex Parker and Katie Lam
Chris Heath
Dina and Rosabella Gregory
Annabel Mutale Reed and Jack Trzcinski
Ethan Lewis Maltby and Jenna Donnelly
Jen Green and Caroline Wigmore
Pete Rowe and Ben Goddard
Timothy Knapman and Laurence Mark Wythe
Chris Burgess
Andy Collyer and Simon Warne
Jon Robyns and Christopher J Orton
Poppy Burton Morgan
Pippa Cleary, Phillip LaZebnik and Ronald Kruschak
Karl Lewkowicz and Amy Rosenthal
Consulting partnerships include:
Runaway Entertainment
Jamie Hendry Productions
Katy Lipson/ Aria Entertainment
Mercury Musical Developments/ Musical Theatre Network
writer Testimonials
Kate is an exemplary dramaturg and someone we simply adore working with – we’ve now worked with her on 4 of our produced musicals which says it all! In terms of how she comes into our process, in the first instance we will run our initial story ideas by her, then go away and work up a synopsis and present it back to her for her thoughts and advice. It’s reassuring to know that she will respond to this positively, but always offer interesting and unexpected insights. Throughout the writing process, we may check in with her after writing songs, scenes, or lengthy sections we are working on, but we always know we can go to her as soon as we feel that we need her. As a writing duo, we often lean on her as our mediator when we can’t reach a conclusion between us – sometimes the answer is staring us in the face and she will spot it immediately. And sometimes she can just be the very person we need to tell us that what we’ve done isn’t good enough! Her knowledge of musical theatre is second to none, and we trust her opinion implicitly. The list of writers she has worked with is testament to her brilliance in developing new musicals.
Jake Brunger and Pippa Cleary – Prodigy, Red Riding Hood, Treasure Island and Chicken Little
Making a musical takes time. It’s a long process and there are lots of different brains that join you along the way. For the writing, the most important new brain is the dramaturg. Unlike a director, whose focus is rightly split between the piece and the production, a dramaturg is only there to serve the story. The role requires an individual who can recognise a shows potential, even if the writers have lost their way. Someone who respects the creative process, but is prepared to challenge it if it’s what the show needs. Basically, it takes a very specific type of artist to be a good dramaturg. And that’s why we’re writing this. Because Kate Golledge is a fantastic dramaturg.
Collaborating with her was one of the most enjoyable and inspiring processes we’ve ever been part of. Kate’s detail and nuance with text and storytelling is matched only by her ability to constantly view the bigger picture. What are the audience feeling? What is the story doing? Her musicality and understanding of song and orchestration is hugely impressive, it encouraged us to be bolder and braver with our writing and, as a result, create a more impactful and memorable score. Over and above her technical skill, however, it’s her management and sensitivity towards the people she works with that elevate her as a creative. There’s no show, or writers, that wouldn’t benefit from working with Kate and it’s our privilege to have already had the pleasure.
Scott Gilmour and Claire McKenzie aka Noisemaker – Legend Trippers
Making a new musical is a collaborative endeavour, so you’d better have good people you trust on board when you start writing one. It was our enormous good fortune, when bringing our musicals Midnight and Growl! to the stage, to have Kate on our side, offering insight, inspiration and brilliant ideas. They’re very different shows, but Kate contains multitudes and she was just as brilliant with a dark romance set in the shadow of Stalin’s purges as a family show about the Big Bad Wolf. Kate makes you believe you can work wonders and, with her help, you can!
Timothy Knapman – Midnight and Growl!
Being a writer can be a very lonely job – I’ve lost count of the amount of times I’ve disregarded projects because I can’t tell if they are any good or not! Having somebody to bounce off of creatively, or collaborate with is such a life-saver when it comes to the writing process. Kate is excellent at knowing the right exercises and conversations to have with a writer in order to push a project forward, and keep your imagination firing. My play POSTERBOY has benefitted hugely from Kate’s influence and shaped the piece into (genuinely) something I had never quite imagined – allowing me to play with style in a way I hadn’t considered before. Kate will always be my first port of call for a creative question and always will be. Collaboration is a writers best friend, and Kate is the friendliest of all!
James Robert Moore – Posterboy and It’s Been Nice Knowing You
Kate has such a brilliant dramaturgical mind. Plus she understands the art of provocation rather than offering a solution to the problem herself. Also she’s a delight to work with. I would collaborate with her again in a heartbeat.
Poppy Burton Morgan – Housefire
Kate is such a joy to work with. Often what you need, particularly as a book-writer, is someone to throw a million ideas at you. Not all the ideas — or even any of them! — need to become part of the show, but one or two might fix your sticky problem, or spark off your own solution, or help you better understand the issues you might have. Kate is simply brilliant at generating these ideas and she does it so unpretentiously, openly and positively that it puts you in the perfect frame of mind to make the most of all she suggests. I personally find the rehearsal room and process often wonderful but occasionally intimidating and uncomfortable; Kate makes anything negative go away instantly through the force of her radiant personality and creative talent. I would jump at the chance to work with her any time.
Katie Lam – Henrietta
Kate directed My Marcello at Theatre Royal Stratford East for BEAM2018. She was the glue. Everyone felt happy having her in the room and Dina and I felt invincible with Kate at the helm. Her professionalism and experience was obvious, but what really struck me was her kindness. It is wonderful to have worked – albeit for a short period – with someone who invests wholly in the people and the project she is committed to.
Rosabella Gregory – My Marcello
This is the first time I have worked with Kate and I’m finding it insightful, easy, fun and challenging (in the best possible way!). I am so very grateful she is taking the time to help us on our journey and I already have plans to approach her with other projects! Look out, Kate. You brought this on yourself!
Christopher J Orton – Then, Now & Next
Jon Robyns – Then, Now & Next
Working with Kate was brilliant. She really ‘got’ the piece, honoured the vision and brought it to life. It was a highly enjoyable and rewarding process!
Tamar Broadbent – The List
Kate is our go-to dramaturg for our musical theatre work for young audiences. Her considered notes and advice always jump straight to the heart of any problem we’re rubbing up against, and her experience across a wide range of new musical theatre means that she approaches dramaturgy through a directors eyes, which is invariably just what we need. We were commissioned to write a show with very strict perimeters in terms of a cast size of 2 and a tourable set, but a full and diverse community of characters and locations. Kate’s advice on theatrical devices that we could use to facilitate double casting, and ways we could think about using set and design as an integral part of the way we approached storytelling was invaluable. Working with her, our restrictions seemed like a theatrical gift rather than a limitation.
Jen Green and Caroline Wigmore – The Gingerbread Man, Errol’s Garden
Working with Kate was hugely rewarding and a great pleasure. With her long experience of new writing and workshops, Kate guided us through the rapids of a first workshop. With her invaluable dramaturgical advice, she delivered us safe, happy and enriched, through to a successful reading and ready for the next stage.
Karl Lewkowicz – The Queen and I
Kate’s support and dramaturgical skills contributed enormously to the success of our reading. She is a calm, warm presence in the rehearsal room, a strong leader in a workshop setting and a clear-eyed guide on script development.
Amy Rosenthal – The Queen and I
Working with Kate on The Battle of Boat was an incredibly useful and fulfilling process. Having such a creative mind look through our work and offer a fresh perspective became a key element in the development of the show. Kate’s knowledge and creativity is both deep and intuitive and she was able to find the core of the show and make suggestions which we simply hadn’t thought of. This enabled us to revisit the piece in its current form and make various tweaks to bring the pacing and narrative into sharper focus. We found working with Kate to be so illuminating, we then brought her in on our next show The Masters of Mystery for her input and found it equally as useful. She was a delight to work with (it’s never easy dealing with precious creatives) and always respectful of our material.
Ethan Lewis Maltby and Jenna Donnelly – The Battle of Boat and Masters of Mystery
We were new to writing for stage when we worked with Kate on Super Hero as part of NYMT’s 2018 season. We are so incredibly grateful to have worked with Kate, and her advice has been invaluable for our careers. We worked together to produce a one act musical in just over one week. Throughout the process, Kate’s input helped us to mould the musical into its full potential under very strict time constraints. Despite having to graft together to pull it off, we still had tonnes of fun. A fantastic, patient and intuitive director, and would certainly recommend her as a dramaturg to writers new and experienced alike.
Adam Johnson and Henry Roadnight – Super Hero
Kate’s great skill is in taking something to pieces with tact and humour and a real understanding of the mechanics of a piece of writing – and then – more importantly – helping one to put it back together again. Her other great ability is in assisting you to write the piece that you want to write, and not another version that someone else might want to write! I recommend Kate for dramaturgical work without hesitation. She is a joy to work with.
Chris Burgess – That’s Jewish Entertainment and Yes, Miss
