Silver Noodle Soup is a Wellington-based charitable trust where disabled people aged approximately 16–35 are fully included in the leadership and direction of all aspects of theatrical and cinematic creativity - from development and production to promotion and performance.
Photo credit: Roc Torio
Our story
Silver Noodle Soup’s history, written by Artistic Director Madeline McNamara
Silver Noodle Soup’s origins began with Maggie Rose Paine doing some private drama lessons with me in Maggie’s last year at Onslow College. I worked alongside one of her friends from school who had since left, Sylvie McCreanor, and videographer/musician Ingrid Saker. We worked in one of the tiny piano rooms at Onslow, which honestly, was more like a broom cupboard. We were supposed to be doing drama but it involved a good deal of vocal and physical experimentation loosely based on the work of the Roy Hart Theatre based in Malérargues in France.
Later that year and due to Bernie’s (Bernadette Macartney, Maggie Rose’s mum) advocacy for disabled students we started annual 3-day film making workshops with senior disabled students from Onslow College. These occurred over three years during which time we produced a number of short films. Observing the excitement and collaborative spirit of these workshops it became clear that Maggie was thriving working alongside other performers.
So here were our origins. Maggie Rose, experimental performance artist and musician/singer, becomes the founding member of Silver Noodle Soup as others fell, one by one, under her artistic sway. Around her grew a large number of collaborators, fellow performers, and tutors tasked with focusing her and their considerable talents into our unique brand of theatre and film production. This ushered in a new period of time working with a small group committed to weekly classes at the Vogelmorn Bowling Club. This eventually grew to the company we have now which comprises 13 actors when all are present.
A word about our name. The name emerged from one of the early Onslow film workshops. The name Silver Noodle Soup was inspired by the tacky but brilliant, shiny silver foil tinsel wig that Nick Johnson used in his depiction of the Tin Man from The Wizard of Oz. The phrase emerged effortlessly from the group and was responded to with such joy, it stuck. The shiny strands of the wig resembled noodles but also referenced old transparent film strips which were partly made up with silver halide crystals, the soup, reflected the diversity of the group’s interests and backgrounds.
Workshops during those years were led by Madeline alongside a variety of wonderful professional actors; it’s essential to acknowledge their contribution to the development of the company. These were important years and there were many films and live performances. However, not having a consistent tutor group meant that only one-off performances were ever possible. This all changed in early 2023 when Stevie Hancox-Monk and Hannah Kelly joined the company as tutors and co-directors of this new work. Their rare commitment and talents have allowed us to plan on a much more ambitious scale. This season of work signals a new phase in the work of Silver Noodle Soup, a big step up in terms of our company’s professional life.
The work is underpinned by the incredible support and mahi of the Macartney Paine whanau and the Silver Noodle Soup Board of Trustees which includes 3 of the actors.
To date, we have created a core company of 13 actors working with them on 40 theatre skills and devising workshops a year, with an additional 20 workshops a year for the core intensive group. We have devised and produced 17 live performances and 1 online performance, including shows at BATS Theatre, Te Whaea, the Hannah Playhouse, and as part of Disabled Artists’ Festival of Theatre (DAT Fest) and Disability Pride Weeks. In all we have now produced and publicly screened five short films as well as HEARTH, our award-winning 48Hour Film Festival entry (2024). Most of these have been with our core company but some have also included a wider group of disabled actors and some in schools. All these are available our YouTube channel — 11,000+ views. We have also worked with students from Mana college, won awards at the 48 Hour Film Festival, held community drama workshops run by our Company members, and now in April 2026, are presenting our first full-scale professional production.
Radical inclusion
The company models what can happen when disabled actors are given the same chances that other non disabled actors are, i.e regular training and performance opportunities, a valuing of their life experiences and their unique perspectives, seeking out their stories, encouraging their hopes and dreams as artists, and taking them and their aspirations as performing artists seriously. This also involves including them in the management and direction of their company. We take our place alongside other professional, innovative theatre makers in the city in order to normalise this kind of inclusion. The participation of SNS actors in projects such as Barbarian Productions’ ‘RUCKUS’; the PickPath initiative led by Binge Culture’s Joel Baxendale; the DAT Festival; and the 48Hour Film Festival are all examples of this. The support we get from the wider theatre sector and practitioners in Te Whanganui-a-Tara is also a sign that our approach and work is not only needed, but welcomes. The theatre community benefits from fresh approaches to creating theatre and from radical inclusion.
We are redefining what it means for the creative arts to be inclusive of, and led by, disabled people. We are reflecting that change to other theatre makers in the city, and to our shared audiences. We provide new experiences for theatre audience and contribute to a more expansive understanding of what and who ‘counts’ in the arts. Inclusion is not just about access for audiences, but for creating opportunities to make art at the highest levels like any other hard working practitioner.
