Barry Church-Woods (One to Watch – The Herald Scottish Culture Awards) is an artist, activist and lover of greyhounds based in Central Scotland. In the past year his work has been profiled in The New York Times, Vanity Fair, Deadline, The Hollywood Reporter, OUT, The Sunday Times, The Guardian, The Daily Telegraph, BBC, Spectator, Sky News, Fox News, Le Monde, Playbill, The Stage and The Indepedent.
2025 marks the 30th anniversary of his varied career as a performer, writer, director, producer, filmmaker and visual artist. As the founder of Edinburgh based production house Civil Disobedience, he specialises in amplifying projects that promote the key tenets of equality, diversity and inclusion, whilst profiling the voices of marginalised communities.
Those projects have included NYC theatre powerhouse The Representatives Fringe debut Private Manning Goes to Washington, Sasquatch the Opera, from US rock star Roddy Bottum premiering at BAM in Brooklyn before enjoying a 22 date run at Summerhall, and their self penned immersive club show Jock Tamson’s Bairns (Winner, Best Immersive Production – Scottish Enterprise Culture Awards 2020), in which he also performed the central role.
In 2024 he was Creative Producer and Co-director of TERF (‘the most provocative play to hit the Edinburgh Fringe in years’ – The Daily Telegraph), received a Creative Scotland grant to write his semi-autobiographical play Now I Know You’re Mine about two teenagers hitchhiking their way to London to see Madonna’s Blonde Ambition Tour, and at the start of this year, he led the research and development phase of bringing this production to market.
In 2023 he was resident dramaturg and script doctor for international production ensemble SRSLY_yours overseeing the genesis of their offerings Picture Perfect and Tea Ceremony, the latter receiving the jurors award at Milano Off while receiving a string of 5 star reviews globally.
His most recent credits as a writer include Now I Know You’re Mine, Jock Tamson’s Bairns ( ‘consistently powerful’ – The List), STIGMA for HIV Scotland (‘often daring, always innovating’ – Scotsgay), and Paisley Radicals, an immersive app-led walking tour originally commissioned as a large scale street performance that pivoted in form as a response to Covid19.
As a director he’s helmed the Civil Disobedience production of Larry Kramer’s The Normal Heart (‘Groundbreaking’ – British Theatre Guide) and camp comedy cabarets The Bugle Boys & The Bugle Boys Christmas Crackers at Assembly (Pick of the Fringe – Daily Record). Keeping with his immersive proclivities, he delivered the creative for the Edinburgh presentation of immersive hit show Joe’s NYC Bar (‘Utterly engrossing, imagine Bukowski had written an episode of Cheers – BroadwayBaby.com ) which was the catalyst to a remounted Creative Scotland funded production of Jock Tamson’s Bairns (Best of the Fest).
The success and high profile of TERF (Winner – Somewhere for Us Awards 2025) this past year has encouraged Church-Woods to focus his theatre making efforts in the genesis of new projects to take advantage of the industry attention. While work is being carried out to attach a tour producer to his latest project Now I Know You’re Mine, he now turns his creative focus onto a new offering, Unicorns on the Road, again, funded through the generous support of Creative Scotland’s Open Fund for Individuals.
BCW delivers his creative best in collaboration with other brilliant artists, and is always keen to hear about work where his particular brand of trouble making can add value.
Adjunct to his role as an artist, he delivers a number of roles to support the development of artists including as an advisor for Creative Scotland, project development for independent artists and as a juror for the Bruce Dewar Award, Milano Off and Catania International Theatre Festival.
This website showcases his current portfolio of live projects. For legacy projects, check out wearecivildisobedience.com
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
None of my work could be made without the generous support of funders, investors and cultural champions. I’m a grateful recipient of Creative Scotland’s Open Fund for Individuals (2019), (2023), (2024) and (2025). I’d also like to acknowledge their support during lockdown through the Covid19 Cancellation Fund for Creative Freelancers.
Thanks also to the following project funders:
Scottish Government
Edinburgh Festivals’ Momentum
Paisley First
TH.CARS
RSC Incubator
Surge
HIV Scotland
HEBS
Fife Friends
Actors Studio NYC
LGBT Centre NYC
Brooklyn Academy of Music
National Museums of Scotland
Fruitmarket Gallery
Assembly
CCA
Tron
Paisley Arts Centre
Summerhall
Underbelly
Gilded Balloon
Big Burns Festival
The Byre Theatre
WhiteSpace
EICC
East Lothian Council
West Lothian Council
Fife Council
Perth and Kinross Council
BCW 