Sonia Sabri Company’s commission for The Hundred
The Hundred is a thrilling tournament of 100-ball cricket matches, involving eight men's and women's teams and hosted in stadiums around the UK. This year was the fifth year of the tournament and included Birmingham’s own Birmingham Phoenix teams.
Sonia Sabri Company was commissioned to create bespoke performances for the opening ceremonies of the men’s and women’s matches at Edgbaston Stadium on Friday 8th August 2025. The Company was head-hunted by a production team, who’s portfolio includes the London Olympics and Birmingham Commonwealth Games, based on our track-record of delivering high-quality productions and impactful large scale outdoor work.
The performances were created especially for the event by Sonia Sabri MBE, with composer Sarvar Sabri, also composing new music for the productions. Sonia’s vision was to open the women’s match with a medium-scale performance with eight professional, female dancers portraying themes of female diversity and empowerment. For the opening of the men’s match, the performance would incorporate a community cast alongside professional dancers and puppeteers to create a joyful and colourful procession and dance finale.
Preparations and rehearsals
Delighted to have the opportunity to showcase the Company’s work in a new forum, preparations were underway immediately to gather performance team. Sonia recruited a team of professional dancers trained in a range of dance forms including Kathak, Bharatanatyam, Ballet and Contemporary, many of whom have performed with the Company on our Mughal Miniatures productions. We also issued an open call-out, invited emerging artists and dancers-in-training to join our community cast. Through a whirlwind recruitment and audition process we were delighted to appoint a strong group of dancers from a range of backgrounds; passionate about dance and eager to be part of Sonia’s artistic vision.
Everyone working on the project from the directors, creatives, performers to our admin team demonstrated immense effort, dedication and commitment to bring these performances to life. Sonia spent every waking moment working on choreography, leading rehearsals and creative direction. Sonia worked with the dancers to create the choreography, using the way they responded to her creative and movement tasks to create elements of the pieces. Sarvar devoted countless hours to composing, recording musicians in the studio and editing to create the new music tracks for the performances.
Our Creative Designer worked tirelessly to source and alter costumes for the dancers, including giving pre-loved and donated pieces a new life. The dancers committed to an intense period of rehearsals, with our community cast fitting in as many rehearsals as possible around their day jobs and studies. We also commissioned expert puppet-maker Naomi Oppenheim to create a large-scale phoenix puppet which would be operated by three puppeteers to bring a sense of magic and wonder to the final performance.
The big day!
The sun shone on our happy and excited team as we entered Edgbaston Stadium ready to share all our hard work from the previous weeks. The dressing rooms were filled with a buzz of excitement and some nerves as, for many of the 31 performers, this was their first time dancing on such a high-profile stage to a crowd of thousands.
Opening the Women’s match to around 15,000 spectators, our first piece, inspired by historic Mughal miniature paintings, began with a freeze-frame, creating the illusion of a painting. Each dancer had her own character from the royal Mughal court, including queen, warrior, musician, servant. The performers then split into two groups: one showcasing Indian classical dance and the other contemporary dance – though contrasting, the dance illustrated the vast range of qualities women hold, displaying elegance, grace, playfulness, creativity, power and strength. To finish, the two groups came together and danced with colourful sashes, flying the flag of womanhood, solidarity and freedom from societal expectations!
In the early evening, we performed for the opening of the men’s match to a live audience of over 20,000 people. The community cast were split into four groups, each spotlighting a dance form: Kathak, Bharatanatyam, Bhangra and Indian Folk, and led by a professional dancer. Each group was also accompanied by one of SSCo’s beautiful animal puppets: our elephant, gazelle and two peacocks! To open the performance, the cast processed around one side of the pitch, while our spectacular phoenix puppet flew round the other side, to the warm cheers and applause of the spectators. All the performers came together for a celebratory grand finale of upbeat and high energy dance.
The impact
This was a significant moment for Sonia Sabri Company, again cementing our position as a leader in the both the South Asian arts sector and the wider outdoor arts industry. We are so proud to have once again created new work in collaboration with both professional, student and community artists, demonstrating Sonia’s skill in bringing diverse performers together to create something new. We were delighted to see the work so well-received by audiences who might be new to both the arts and South Asian culture - both in-person and at-home - as segments from both performances were broadcasted on Sky Sports and viewed by approximately one million viewers.
Like all Sonia Sabri Company’s work, the performances successfully combined Indian classical art forms with contemporary and urban styles, exploring heritage in a way which speaks to a wide demographic of audiences and gently challenges what people think of when they think of British Arts and Culture. We believe the work paralleled The Hundred’s own hybrid identity, reframing cricket as a cultural activity and which can evolve whilst still honouring a diverse and multicultural fanbase. It was great to see the engagement with clips and photos shared by The Hundred on their social media platforms, with the comments section full of individuals overjoyed to see the cultural diversity of the UK celebrated in this way.
This experience also meant so much to the individual performers involved, who were given this incredible opportunity of working with a world-renowned choreographer and performer as well as performing on a high-profile stage. The experience increased their own self-confidence and increased their appreciation of dance and its power on their own lives and wider society!
“It was my first time watching a stadium cricket match, and it was amazing to be there not just as an audience member but as a performer. Performing for such a big, lively crowd was an experience I’ll never forget. I really relished the opportunity, and I’m so grateful to Sonia Ji for giving me the chance to dance in a stadium, it was truly fantastic.” Swathi Acharya
“With Sonia ji, it was not just like training or performing for any other, her approach to the process of choreography and her unique ways where she lets artists of myriad of styles and repertoire come together making us one big colourful portrait of everything that breaks borders, blends traditions and sows joy is simply beyond what words can ever narrate.
With SSCo and Sonia ji, it was not just a choreography learnt, but rather an artistic experience lived, and the support that I received from the staff especially Mary, is indeed commendable.
From Bharatanatyam to Kathak to folk and puppetry combined with the ever-infectious energy and charisma that SSCo brought for The Hundred is definitely a memorable day, one that I am sure the people of UK and especially those who felt the performance shall be cherishing for a long, long time.
It was an honour, pleasure and beyond all great opportunity for which I shall always be thankful to SSCo and Sonia Didi, and I shall be looking forward to more learning sharing and joy.” Anaash Bhattathirippad
Our huge thanks to all our artists and participants:
Professional Cast: Aakanksha Rawat, Adithi Ravi Prakesh, Chandana Gopalakrishna, Freya Davis, Holly Jones, Jasmine Ainley-Kaur, Rosa Lieckens, Shrishti Gandhi
Community Cast: Anaash Bhattathirippad, Anvitha Rengarajan, Arif Ali, Jaseela Pradhayini, Kane Willis, Meera Pandit, Neha Yadav, Niyathi Sethu, Pradha Kutty, Ratnavali Babre, Shanti Swaroop Prabhakar, Shriya Shrikanth, Shriya Sharma, Simi Sabri, Sruthi Chinnan, Surubhi Badre, Swathi Shree Vadivelu, Thanuja Chelvanathan, Thurga Tharmarajah
Puppeteers: Gabrielle Rothwell, Mary Bonam, Tom Bonam
Watch The Hundred recap on Sonia Sabri Company’s Instagram and snippets of The Hundred Opening Ceremony for the men’s match on our YouTube!