WATERMELON (WIP)
Previous shown at the Royal Court and the Sands Theatre Studio.
Watch this space for more dates.
Dee is a part-time DJ, part-time Tiktok activist… and a full-time hot mess.
Online, she has thousands of people hanging onto her every word. IRL, she’s barely hanging on.
Even with the click-baiting, clapbacks and the comment section, Dee finds safety on online platforms that she isn’t afforded beyond the firewalls.
But amongst the thirst traps, is one trans girl’s desperate thirst for connection and validation.
Even if it costs losing everything around her.
Watermelon is a fictionalized narrative drama drawn from Enxi’s personal experiences as a trans woman navigating virtual and IRL spaces.
TL; DR a standard Tuesday night when you're a trans girl on the internet.
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Comissioned by Papergang, Watermelon was first shown as an extract as part Queer Upstairs at the Royal Court and PuSh! Festival Vancouver in 2022. As the play continues to develop, it has had work in progress performances with with the support of Lung Theatre at the Sands Theatre Studio, and at the Chinese Arts Now rehearsal space at NDT Broadgate.
Enxi is a British-Chinese writer, actor, spoken word poet and rapper. Her work has been aired at the Southbank Centre, the Royal Court and on Benjamin Zephaniah’s Life and Rhymes. She is also a TikToker who, in addition to making thirst traps, uses her platform to discuss intersectional racial, gender and sexual politics, with other educational content that touches on classical Chinese culture, linguistics, music and more.
