Amanda Payne is a playwright, actor and singer based in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Due to her bilingual (English/Dutch) upbringing, she aims to challenge the conventions of language and text in theatre. In her writing she uses repetition, rhythm and compositional techniques to elevate everyday language. This results in intricately structured and musically written plays. Amanda has a diploma in Music Theatre from Codarts University of the arts in Rotterdam. She has toured the Netherlands and Belgium performing in musical theatre productions and she has written and performed her own plays with a number of music theatre collectives. Her works have been shown at theatre festivals such as O. Festival, Amsterdam Fringe Festival, Rewire Festival and in theatres such as Theater Kikker, DeLaMar and Theater Walhalla. Besides working as an actor, translator and assistant director, she is also an experienced voice-over artist.

Amanda Payne was born in 1995. She completed undergraduate studies at Codarts University of the Arts in 2018 and is momentarily a postgraduate student following the Re:master Opera program at the Sandberg institute in Amsterdam.

Artist Statement

Through her work Amanda researches musicality within speech by combining her background in singing with text theatre. She is interested in how the uniqueness of voice is revealed whilst playing with words, impersonating others and exploring the performativity of the mouth. This results in multilayered pieces reshaping linguistic matter and vocal-textures. Her practice is translated through mediums such as poetry, spoken-word, performance, song and playwriting.