A Mustard Seed from a House Untouched by Death

Call-out for writer-performers from North East Scotland

Applications are now open to take part in A Mustard Seed from a House Untouched by Death by Mae Diansangu which will debut with a work-in-progress performance at WayWORD Festival 2026. We’re looking for three writer-performers to create a five-minute extract of new writing that will be performed as part of the play on Sunday 11th October at Cowdray Hall.

Read more about the project and call-out below.

Project

A grieving woman, desperate to undo death, learns of a cure to revive her loved ones. First, she must source the remedy’s main ingredient: a mustard seed from a household untouched by death. Blending storytelling, poetry and song, A Mustard Seed from a House Untouched by Death, tells the transformative journey of a woman tasked with completing the impossible. This retelling of a Buddhist parable weaves together seemingly disparate stories, revealing how we are all bound together by the shared inevitabilities of loss and hope.

Following a development period over summer 2026, A Mustard Seed from a House Untouched by Death will debut with a work-in-progress performance at the iconic Cowdray Hall as the closing event of WayWORD Festival 2026. Taking advantage of the venue’s stunning architecture and acoustics, this intimate performance will allow audiences to experience the hall in an unusual lay-out accompanied by both live music and visual theatre.

The play is written by Mae Diansangu and directed by Annabel Lunney, with dramaturgical support from Jenna Watt. This project is funded by Creative Scotland and WayWORD Festival, with support from Aberdeen Art Galleries and Museums.

Call-Out for Writer-Performers

Through an accompanying creative engagement project, A Mustard Seed from a House Untouched by Death will weave together Mae’s words with original storytelling extracts from three local writer-performers who will each build the worlds of the households the woman visits across her journey.

The call-out is now live to apply to be part of this project. We’re looking for three artists to join the project who will each be responsible for writing and performing a five-minute extract of text that represents one of the households. This can be in any form for example: dramatic monologue, spoken word, narrative poetry. Ultimately, the woman doesn’t find a mustard seed from a house untouched by death in the places she visits, so we’re looking for writers to create a piece which explores how those living in each household have been impacted by loss and grief.

For this application, we want to hear your idea for depicting a household and how you would approach writing about these themes. You might consider tone, character, perspective, living arrangement, experience, time, worldview and the response/advice they share to the woman’s journey. We aren’t looking for any new writing at this stage, just a sense of your extract idea.

We’re looking for writer-performers who:

Are based in the North East of Scotland
Have experience writing and performing their own work as a poet, spoken word artist, theatremaker, storyteller or similar
Would be interested in creating a new piece of writing to a brief with support from a dramaturg
Are confident performing their work script-in-hand to an audience with support from a director
Have good availability across Tuesday 6th October and Saturday 10th October (at least a half day on each date)
Are available for the performance day on Sunday 11th October

Successful writers will receive:

Audience feedback on their work should they want it (not required)
A £450 fee to cover three days of engagement across writing, rehearsal and performance
Writing support from an experienced playwright and dramaturg
Performance support from an experienced director
Professional performance photography on the night

Project Timeline

Upon successful application, artists will be sent a more detailed brief and invited to ask any questions about the project
Artists can begin work on their extracts from Wednesday 9th September onwards
Deadline for first draft extracts is Sunday 27th September
Artists will receive dramaturgical feedback on week commencing 28th September to inform light-touch editing/redrafting
Artists are called for rehearsals across Tuesday 6th October and Saturday 10th October. Rehearsals will total one day of rehearsal across the two dates; exact rehearsal times will be confirmed once artists are onboard. (For example, we may rehearse for one full day or a half day on each).
Artists are called for a full day on Sunday 11th October for rehearsals and the evening performance at 6pm.

How to Apply

To apply, please submit the following information via our Google Form application.

A short biography about your experience and how you like to write/perform (max. 200 words)
A paragraph about the piece you would like to write and how you would approach it (max. 500 words)

And either:

A short video of you performing your own writing (this could be at an event or at home).

Or:

A short excerpt of your writing (max. one page) AND a short video of you performing

For accessibility, we are also happy to receive proposals by video or audio recording of no more than 5 minutes in length. Please answer all questions and send by email (with a link to view or download via YouTube, WeTransfer or similar platforms) to wayword@abdn.ac.uk

Successful applicants will be selected based on the strength of their idea and writing/performance submission, but it’s worth noting that they will also be curated based on the other ideas we select to ensure a diverse and complementary line-up.

Applications close at Midnight on Sunday 30th August and all applicants will be notified of the outcome on or before Wednesday 9th September.

If you require any additional support in submitting a proposal, such as receiving the call-out information in an alternative format, or you have any questions please contact us at wayword@abdn.ac.uk