Footsbarn Theatre, France, June 2025

WHO IS JONATHAN KAY?

Jonathan Kay is recognised as a leading performer in the ‘Theatre of Immediacy’ of Fooling, and is a highly respected practitioner and teacher of Fooling workshops. He is the founder of the largest street theatre festival in the UK, The Hat Fair, and is an Honorary Fellow of The University of Winchester. He primarily works as a performer and teacher, touring and teaching throughout the world as a Fool for the last 50 years.

He is part of the family at Glastonbury Festival, with over 25 successive years in the main Theatre tent, and has performed at countless festivals across Europe including Rudolstadt, Sweden’s infamous ‘No Mind’ festival and the Sunday Papers Live in London. He has performed and taught in Canada, the USA, Australia, South Korea and Jordan and extensively throughout Europe and the UK, including time at the prestigious Drama Centre and The Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London. In 2019 he was invited to give a sold out talk at TedX Manchester where he turned the event completely on it’s head to a rapturous audience, and in the same year had a lengthy feature and interview on BBC World News to an audience of millions.

Jonathan’s stomping ground is on the cliff between inertia and speed, encouraging participants to fly or to learn how to land, not only in their imagination but also in their purpose. He helps us to look at the hypothetical anchors that can tie people down for a lifetime, engaging them in a compassionate, humorous and sometimes challenging way so they can liberate themselves, turning what appears to be valueless into gold.