If you don't know...Gabriel Akamo
…Let me introduce you!
Gabriel Akamo is an actor, poet, educator and sometimes creative producer and dramaturg, based in North London.
I asked Gabriel some questions!
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HALEY: How do you describe your work?
GABRIEL: This is something I still struggle with. Like most creatives and freelancers, I can feel unsure and bluster long replies when asked on those days. I asked my friend, Laurie, how she'd describe my work day-to-day, and she said 'creative polymath'. Though I want to add I spent a lot of time engaging with others' work or being horizontal.
HALEY: What’s your artistic mission?
GABRIEL: This is also something that shifts from time to time. Right now, it is to be meaningful and useful: being a Philosophy graduate, I want to explore questions in a way that is emotive and accessible.
HALEY: What are 1-3 of your favourite projects so far?
GABRIEL: My favorite projects have been the ones I learned the most on, where I have felt the most stretched, pushed, uncomfortable, or pressured. The Tempest at Northampton’s Royal & Derngate in 2016; Hamlet and Pericles - both by The Show Must Go Online. My pamphlet, At the Speed of Dark.
HALEY: Where did you study or train?
GABRIEL: I haven’t formally trained in the traditional, drama school sense. I was already graduating university when I decided to change paths and become an actor. I have trained mostly through doing. I joined the National Youth Theatre upon graduating and was in shows with them. Then I trained with The Actors Class, under the amazing Mary Doherty.
As a poet, I’ve come through the SLAMbassadors, Roundhouse Poetry Collective, Barbican Young Poets, Apples and Snakes Writing Room, and BBC Words First. My many great mentors include: Jacob Sam-La Rose (founder of the BYP), Bohdan Piasecki, Rachel Long, Paula Varjack, Joelle Taylor, Debris Stevenson, Yomi Sode, and Laurie Bolger.
HALEY: What are you working on now?
GABRIEL: I have done [what feels like] a lot of workshop facilitation, poetry, and Zoom theatre recently. Most recently I’ve worked with Utopia Theatre, The Shakespeare Ensemble, and The Show Must Go Online in a number of their First Folio shows and their recent production of Pericles. Mostly poetry, although I feel the back-to-back Lockdowns have slowed me down. I’ve also been getting back into Philosophy, and I want to return to dramatic writing this year.
HALEY: What artist(s) do you look up to?
GABRIEL: Fela Kuti, Lágbájá, Moses Sumney, Daniel Day-Lewis, Don Warrington, Idris Elba, Christopher Eccleston, Ludwig Göransson, Viola Davis, Chadwick Boseman (RIP), Dave Filoni, Roger Robinson, R.A. Villanueva.
My peers. I’m lucky to have a community of supportive people who are also incredible at what they do.
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Buy Gabriel’s pamphlet: At the Speed of Dark (pub. Bad Betty Press, described by Gabriel as “an indie publisher run by a poet power couple, Jake Wild Hall and Amy Acre, already making waves”.). Listen to his podcast with Jeremiah Brown (aka SugarJ Poet): The Sugar and Dread Podcast. And follow him on Twitter and Instagram!
Photo credit: Jolade Olusanya, 2019
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