Meet the Bull team!

Ciaran O'Breen

Ciaran is an actor, workshop facilitator and BSL guide from Bristol. He was a finalist for an Offie award in 2025. 

Previous Deafinitely Theatre credits include: Can Bears Ski? and Getting There.  

Theatre credits: Wonder Boy (PW Productions/ Bristol Old Vic), Lord of The Flies (Leeds Playhouse, Belgrade Theatre Coventry & Rose Theatre Kingston); Hansel & Gretel (PaddleBoat Theatre); Galwad (National Theatre Wales/ S4C/ Sky Arts); Flood (Theatre Temoin); Red (Polka Theatre), The Story of Guts (Bristol Old Vic’s Made in Bristol) and The Hunchback of Notre Dame (National Youth Musical Theatre). 

Research & Development: Eva (Ad Infinitum), The Little Prince (D-Live), and How High is Up (Fingersmiths).

Jasmine Whipps

Jasmine Whipps (Jazzy) is a UK-based deaf content creator, presenter, actor, and advocate for deaf awareness. With experience across television, commercial campaigns, and social media, she is passionate about working with brands to promote accessibility and raise deaf awareness. She has worked as a TV presenter for OMGenius and also on the See Hear on Tour series. Jazzy trained with the National Youth Theatre at Rose Bruford College and completed the Access to Acting Course at RADA in 2022. Her acting credits include Risking Money: A Romance Scam for Lloyds Bank Academy, Green Grass Project, and The Vagina Monologues with Deafinitely Theatre. 

Danny Lee

David Sands

David Sands began his acting career in 2003 with a leading role in the BBC short film called Granddad. He then made his professional stage debut in a touring production of On Blindness, starting at the Soho Theatre.

David has appeared in numerous theatre and screen productions, including the BBC's Casualty and Definitely Theatre's productions of Love's Labour's Lost and A Midsummer Night's Dream (as Nick Bottom) at Shakespeare's Globe. 

He starred in Lumo TV's sitcom Small World as Chris Baker and embarked on a solo stage tour as Chris Baker. David then wrote a Lumo TV film called The Chris Baker Show: How to Get Rich.

David is also a stand-up comedian, performing gigs for non-deaf audiences without using BSL or an interpreter at several comedy clubs. He also delivers gigs in BSL or International Sign for deaf audiences globally. He occasionally serves as an acting coach and BSL consultant.

Paula Garfield

Paula Garfield, MBE is the Artistic Director of Deafinitely Theatre as well as an actor, director and field creative leader. In 2002, she established Deafinitely Theatre with an aim to create more opportunities for deaf actors and creatives in theatre industry.

Paula has produced and directed many plays. Her  productions for Deafinitely Theatre include: Love’s Labour’s Lost as part of Deafinitely’s 10th anniversary celebrations, and A Midsummer Night’s Dream with Shakespeare’s Globe, Contractions (2017), 4.48 Psychosis (2019), Everyday (2023), The Vagina Monologues (2023) as well as The Vagina Monologues Revival in 2025, The Promise (2024), and Barrier(s) (2025).

Raffie Julien

Raffie Julien is a dynamic deaf actor, dancer, BSL consultant, and movement director from Manchester. Her work spans stage and screen, where she brings powerful storytelling, physical precision, and an unmistakable presence. 

As a creative, Raffie’s credits include Movement Director on Barrier(s) (Deafinitely Theatre), Movement Director and BSL Consultant on Stig (Grosvenor Park Open Air Theatre), BSL Director on The Hunchback of Notre Dame (NYMT) and BSL Presenter/Narrator for Josephine (The Egg, Bath). 

Screen credits include Ariana in A Hand Rises (A Hand Rises Ltd), Jade in Coffee Morning Club (Mutt and Jeff Pictures), Amy in Trinity (Tilt Films), Esther in Jerk (RoughCut TV) and Heather in Clink (Five Star). 

In 2022, Raffie was honoured with the Deaffest Best Actress Award for her moving performance in the short film Lost, Taken, Murdered. 

Paul Burgess

Jessie Addinall

Jessie is a theatrical lighting designer from Hull. Their training is rooted in years of hands-on experience as a technician and theatre maker. Some of their credits include:  

REP Rising (Birmingham Rep), Then Come The Nightjars (Theatre Royal Bury St Edmunds), Children Of The Night (Mad Friday Productions), Oliver Twist (Hull Truck Theatre), Don’t Look Now (The New Wolsey & Salisbury Playhouse), Di and Viv and Rose (Theatre by The Lake & Queens Theatre Hornchurch), Bitch Boxer (Watford Palace Theatre), The Borrowers (Hull Truck), Steel (Theatre by The Lake), Hospital Doors (Next Door But One), Baby He Loves You (Middle Child), Snowmen (The Herd), Pinocchio (Hull Truck),  These Majestic Creatures (Stephen Joseph Theatre), We Could All Be Perfect (Sheffield Theatres), Modest (Middle Child/Milk Presents), Brief Encounter (The New Wolsey & Salisbury Playhouse), Ladies Day (The New Vic & The Octagon Theatre), The Whispering Jungle (Concrete Youth), The Beauty Queen of Leenane (Hull Truck/Queens Theatre Hornchurch), The Canary and The Crow (Middle Child)  

Associate Credits Include: 

The Crucible (The Gaiety Theatre), Animal Farm (The Octagon), Dogs (Liverpool Playhouse), 71 Coltman Street (Hull Truck Theatre), Shedding a Skin (SOHO Theatre).

Ellie Isherwood

Ellie Isherwood is a sound designer, composer, actor / musician and synth-pop artist (BYFYN). Her "dynamic" and “quietly ground breaking” work spans musicals and straight plays alike, embracing an array of forms from site-specific theatre to immersive binaural audio experiences. 

This year, Ellie was made the Associate Artist for The New Wolsey Theatre and was selected as a finalist for the prestigious Stiles and Drewe Best New Song Prize with her song “Nice Girls Never Win." from the upcoming new musical, "VAMP".  

Recent work includes performance and composition for the stage adaptation of Lemony Snicket’s "The Dark" and composition and sound design for "Dweeb-a-mania" at Polka Theatre. 

Other recent credits for theatre include, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (The Orange Tree Theatre); Disco Inferno (National Youth Theatre); The Sleep Show (UK Tour); Cartoonopolis (Pleasance); The Gel (New Diorama) The Intrusion (UK Tour); Tender (The Bush Theatre); The Fir Tree (Arts Depot); Son of a Bitch (Summerhall, Edinburgh Fringe); The Odyssey (The Unicorn); The Light Princess (The Albany, Deptford / ARC - Stockton Arts Centre); The Glass Ceiling Beneath the Stars (Pleasance); and Ruby Wax: I'm Not As Well As I Thought I Was (U.K. Tour).

Ben Glover

Ben Glover, a deaf video designer and creative captioner, has worked extensively across the West End, Shakespeare’s Globe, The Royal Opera House, The Royal Albert Hall and numerous international festivals and venues.  

Credits include: The Promise (Deafinitely Theatre), Little Shop of Horrors (Northern Stage/Derby Theatre), A Single Man (Factory International), Antony and Cleopatra (Shakespeare Globe), Night Bloom (Spectroscope), Lived Fiction (Stopgap), The Rainbow (Perth Theatre), Marx in London (Scottish Opera), High Times and Dirty Monsters (20 Stories High), A Spectacle of Herself (Contra Productions), Best of Enemies (Noël Coward Theatre), Tubular Bells 50th Anniversary Concert Tour, Run Rebel (Pilot Theatre), NOISE (Nua Dance), The Paradis Files (Graeae Theatre) and RED (Polka Theatre).