Facilitating the Authentic Voice: A Creative Director’s Perspective
Stepping into the role of Creative Director with The Flying Child feels like both an exciting challenge and a natural evolution. I’m working to bring to life an audiobook adaptation of The Flying Child: A Cautionary Fairy Tale for Adults by Sophie Olson and Patricia Walsh. Sophie is a Child Sexual Abuse (CSA) survivor activist, author, and researcher, and founder of The Flying Child CIC. This powerful book captures Sophie’s journey alongside her therapist, Pat, as she begins to unearth, confront, and process her experiences of CSA. Through the immersive medium of audio, we aim to make Sophie’s story accessible to an even wider audience.
This feels like the right moment to reflect on how our collaboration came to be and what I bring to this project as an independent director and creative producer with a background in contemporary dance and theatre. We made the bold decision that Sophie and her co-author, Pat, would narrate their own material. Before committing to this, we spent a day last year at Sophie’s kitchen table, reading and recording sections of the book on my Zoom recorder to test their voices, explore different techniques for enhancing delivery and reflect how it might feel to embody their own journeys. My role is to help unlock their vocal expression, equip them with the confidence to share their story in a way that creates a deeply personal connection with the listener, and ensure that the process remains empowering and enriching for them both.
The Skills That Shape My Approach
It’s only recently that I’ve taken the time to reflect on my skill set and recognise the various factors that have shaped the way I work. I now understand how childhood experiences led me to develop coping mechanisms or ‘superpowers’- like hypervigilance and a sensitivity to subtle shifts in energy- that I’ve honed into valuable professional tools. These instincts became particularly powerful in performance, especially in solo shows where connection with an audience was everything. Reading the room, responding intuitively, and shaping my delivery in real time helped me create a sense of intimate exchange.
I’ve always been wired to prioritise acute listening and explore this symbiotic exchange- whether across the 'fourth wall' of a theatre or in close proximity to another performer, where listening happens through energy and touch. These skills transfer into almost every role I take on- teaching, choreographing, facilitating, mentoring, or leading. It doesn’t matter if I’m working with artists, professionals, or vulnerable young people and adults, the same deep listening and attuned presence is required.
As we step into the recording studio, I realise how these skills will serve me in two ways: first, by listening through the ears of the audience, anticipating how the material might be best absorbed, and second, by keeping the process attuned to Sophie and Pat’s emotional needs as they navigate the intensity of speaking their own words aloud.
There is an ongoing conversation around balancing lived experience, intuition, and professional judgment. When needed, I seek supervision from a trained professional and consult trusted individuals for second or third opinions to cross-check concerns or explore difficult decisions. This helps ensure my work stays grounded, reflective, and intentional rather than reactive.
Facilitating the Authentic Voice
Sophie is stepping into new territory with this audiobook. Beyond keynote speeches, panels, and workshops, she is now embodying her written words in an entirely different way. She is exactly the right person to be voicing her book.
During rehearsals, I’m in awe of how effortlessly she inhabits her text. She wrote it, she lived it, and she understands its nuances on multiple levels. She intuitively knows its structure, rhythm, cadence, and tone. She navigates its shifts- from narration to fairy tale, from email to WhatsApp exchanges- with a remarkable fluidity that reflects her deep connection to the material.
My role is to support Sophie and Pat in exploring the full range of their vocal potential. To do this, I’ve given them exercises using children’s stories to stretch volume, speed, pitch, rhythm, and breath control. This playfulness helps unlock elements of vocal expression beyond everyday speech and encourages a more dynamic delivery.
Beyond Sophie’s personal journey, this project has the potential to empower other survivors. For those who wish, or need, to shield their visual identity, audio offers a deeply visceral connection to their story, allowing the most authentic voice to inhabit the words. It provides a powerful means of expression, enabling survivors to be heard and recognised without being seen.
A Relationship Built on Trust
Our working relationship has grown over the past year, built on mutual trust and respect. Initially, I was introduced to The Flying Child with the idea of exploring future creative projects. I quickly found myself travelling alongside Sophie to conferences, training events, and festivals in a supportive, facilitative role. Acting as Sophie’s PA, we work together to optimise the setup, creating the best possible conditions for delivering keynote speeches, co-facilitating training, or speaking on panels.
I approach this role with a deep sense of responsibility, making sure Sophie has everything she needs to bring her A-game to every professional engagement. This means creating an environment where she feels comfortable, supported, and confident. It requires anticipating challenges, staying attuned to shifts in energy, and applying the same skills that drive my artistic practice- sensitivity, adaptability, and creative problem-solving.
As I’ve become more familiar with Sophie’s writing, I can now do more than offer feedback on delivery and audience response. I can recognise the nuances in her text and how she adapts it for different audiences, whether social workers, doctors, mental health practitioners, educators, or survivor activists. I’m also learning by observing her co-design and lead training sessions- seeing what lands, what sparks engagement, and where there is room for refinement.
Personal and Professional Alignment
Working with Sophie aligns deeply with my greatest passion: socially engaged art. For over 15 years, my work has revolved around themes of trauma, identity, and lived experience. Productions I’ve created or collaborated on have explored self-harm, disordered eating, the experiences of women affected by substance misuse, exploitation, and attachment issues. My artistic work has also engaged with LGBTQ+ experiences, HIV and AIDS stigma, Chemsex addiction, and mental health. I have long been invested in access provision in the arts, advocating for marginalised voices and fostering inclusive cultures (2024 Clore Leadership Inclusive Cultures alumni)
A recurring theme in my work is chaos- how we experience and navigate it, particularly through the lens of gender and creative expression (see my MA research enquiry). My own lived experiences have shaped this curiosity, allowing me to approach this work with deep empathy and connection.
This audiobook project is an extension of that journey. It’s an opportunity to transfer my skills into a new medium, to remain informed, attuned, and responsive to the needs of both the storyteller and the audience. My goal is to do this with generosity and self-awareness- to facilitate an authentic voice that doesn’t just tell a story, but leaves a lasting impact.
This blog post is part of an ongoing reflection on my work as Creative Director.
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