RUNNER GIRL: THE STORIES WE CARRY

Photography: Courtney Nathan Phillip. Creative direction: Tanasha Chege.

On movement, memory, girlhood and the kind of theatre that finds you where you are.

There are some theatre nights where you leave thinking about the production.

And then there are nights where you leave thinking about yourself.

I went to see Runner Girl at Brixton House last night because my friend Ewa Dina directed it. I wanted to support her, of course, but I also went in simply ready to watch a piece of theatre.

I wasn't expecting it to stay with me in quite the way it did.

Runner Girl, written and performed by Lara Grace Ilori and directed by Ewa Dina, follows Anu, a young Yoruba South Londoner whose everyday run takes a terrifying turn, opening up memories and feelings she has spent years trying to keep buried. The production moves through poetry, spoken word, movement and music, creating something that feels less like watching a story from the outside and more like being invited into someone's inner world.

And perhaps that's what moved me most.

It felt relatable.

Not necessarily because I had lived Anu's exact story, but because I recognised something in the emotional landscape that felt something I'd experienced myself.

That feeling of carrying things.

Of moving through your everyday life just trying to get by.

Of being expected to keep going.

Sometimes we run because we love running.

Sometimes we run because we're trying to get somewhere.

And sometimes we're running from something we haven't yet found the words to call it out.

THE BODY REMEMBERS

One of the things that stayed with me was the relationship between movement and memory. Selina Jones my Cameroonian sister absolutely killed the movement direction in this show.

Anu's body isn't separate from her story. The running, the rhythm, the repetition — they become part of the language of the piece.

The production uses movement alongside poetry, music and spoken word, and it creates a rhythm that feels almost physical.

I found myself thinking about how much we communicate without saying anything.

What our bodies hold.

SOUTH LONDON. GIRLHOOD. MEMORY.

There was also something very familiar about seeing a young Black woman placed so fully at the centre of her own story.

Not as a side character.

Not as someone's daughter, someone's girlfriend or someone's friend.

But as a whole person.

Messy. Funny. Vulnerable. Complicated. Searching.

Made me think of my first play Yvette and how hard it was to express the longing to understand yourself and the around you when none. of it makes sense.

Its crazy that even the Anu is older than Yvette as a Character they share a language common to the black female experience and that Language is resilience.

WATCHING A FRIEND DIRECT

And then there was the other layer for me:

Watching Ewa and Selina's Direction made me proud.

There's something special about seeing them bring their creative voices into a room.

It also made me think about how many different ways there are to tell a story.

As someone who moves between acting, writing, producing and creating, I'm increasingly interested in that space where all those disciplines meet.

Runner Girl reminded me that theatre doesn't have to stay in one language.

It can be poetry.

It can be movement.

It can be music.

It can be silence.

It can be a body running across a stage.

It can be a memory arriving before you're ready for it.

THE STORIES WE CARRY

What I loved most about Runner Girl was that it didn't feel like it was trying to give me a neat answer.

It gave me a person.

A journey.

A series of questions.

And space to sit with them.

I left Brixton House thinking about the things we carry quietly.

The things we don't talk about.

The versions of ourselves we leave behind.

The things we think we've moved past until something — a place, a song, a smell, a moment — brings them back.

Maybe that's one of the reasons I love theatre.

Because for a couple of hours, someone else's story can hold up a mirror.

And sometimes you don't realize you needed the reflection until you're standing outside the theatre afterwards.

Runner Girl made me feel something.

Lara Grace Ilori has a writing voice people should really look out for, can't wait to see what she does next.

And, most importantly, it reminded me that there is power in seeing stories that feel close to home.

I'm glad I went.

And I'm very glad I got to see my friends Ewa and Selinas work in the world.

Urii x

ORBIT NOTES

WHAT I SAW: Runner Girl WHERE: Brixton House, London WRITTEN & PERFORMED BY: Lara Grace Ilori DIRECTED BY: Ewa DinaMY ORBIT: Theatre · Culture · Black British Stories · Creative Life

Runner Girl was part of Brixton House's Housemates Festival 2026, which brought seven writers and new works into the venue across September.