Theatre Background

Kym trained started studying Fine Art before transferring to Drama School (his family moved to South Africa when he was 16 and as a result he trained at the University of Cape Town which has a superb Speech & Drama course, as Richard E. Grant will testify!) where he got a part scholarship. After graduating with a Bachelor of Arts degree and a performer's Diploma in Speech & Drama, he was immediately employed to work for the Loft Experimental Theatre Co which did both new/experimental theatre as well as traditional productions. In the space of 20 months Kym got to do 14 full scale professional productions, one written by himself and another co-created with Eric Bouvron who now runs Les Odes Bleue with his wife Mercedes, in Paris, France.

After leaving the Loft Company in October 1991, Kym moved to London where he has been ever since. He got frustrated with the work that was on offer and after a few shows went back to college and read his Masters Degree at the Laban Centre in Choreography, Visual Design and Choreology. Thereafter he set up his own company which changed names a few times (Post Mortem Productions, A Few Feet Akimbo, the Soul Song theatre/tSSt!) before settling on "Wicked Bliss Prods" - well, for the moment anyhow. The name may have changed but the concept has always remained the same: to produce quality work which combines theatre and dance/movement to make stimulating entertainment with content. Kym feels that having an audience's attention for a couple of hours is a privilege and shouldn't be wasted. Don't put on a show unless you have something to say - it takes a lot of effort and a lot of money so why go to all that trouble if you don't feel strongly about your product?

As a result he has taken to bringing texts to life which have a lot to say but may not have originally been intended as traditional theatre, such as the poetry of Sufi poet Rumi and the epic poem "The Conference of the Birds" which, despite both being written in the 12th century, have a wealth of pertinent wisdom for the 21st century. Sometimes he works on shows which although seemingly light entertainment contain heavy satire, such as his musical revues "Get Screwed!" and "Dead Right" which deal with issues ranging from education to safe sex to mobile phones and abortion. Click on the link to hear some extracts.

In addition to adapting texts, writing music and choreographing Kym also likes to do stand-up comedy when he can though this is a fairly new venture - watch this space!