After training as an actor, Matthew joined the Soho Theatre’s Young Writers’ group.

Writing credits include: Bear Mountain and Back (BBC 1), Singing! Dancing! Acting! (Soho Theatre, London, and as part of La Foire St Germain, Paris), Mortal Ladies Possessed, a one-woman show based on the short stories of Tennessee Williams, was the first show he wrote for solo performer Linda Marlowe (across the UK as well as in New York as part of 59E59 Theater’s ‘Brits Off-Broadway’ season).

The award-winning musical, Have A Nice Life, for which Matthew wrote the book, premiered at the New York Musical Theatre Festival in 2006 and marked his first collaboration with composer Conor Mitchell. The show has since been performed in Philadelphia and is published by Weinberger’s. His second collaboration with Conor, Pesach, was commissioned by YMT and opened in Belfast the following year.

In summer 2007 Matthew was commissioned by Shakespeare’s Globe to write the prologue for their International Artists Fellowship’s public showing.
Matthew’s most recent play, The Time Step, incorporated the puppetry of Blind Summit and was produced in Brighton, London and at the Edinburgh Festival in 2008.

His adaptations into English include Laure Salama’s performance art piece Life and Death of a Couple of Words and Wajdi Mouawad’s Seuls, which played at 2008’s Avignon Festival and is now touring internationally.

Believe, also originally written for Linda Marlowe, started its run at the Traverse, Edinburgh and has been featured on BBC Radio 4’s Women’s Hour. Since then it has been performed at London’s New End theatre (No. 1 in The Times’ weekly list of shows to see) and at 2008’s Adelaide Fringe Festival, Australia. It is currently being translated into French, German and Swedish. Matthew has been awarded two bursaries by the Peggy Ramsay Foundation and his radio play, Phumzile, has recently been broadcast on BBC Radio 4.

Previous projects with YMT:

• Dance! (2007) – Writer (Book and Lyrics)