Hailed as a fearless director,[2] Rice's work includes theatrical adaptations of Brief Encounter, The Red Shoes and Wise Children.
[5][6] Rice was born in Oxfordshire, England,[7] and grew up in Nottingham, where her mother was a social worker and her father was a lecturer in personnel management.
[9] Alongside touring the UK and performing to children and communities with Alibi, Rice developed her craft, training in Poland, with Gardzienice, a company founded by Włodzimierz Staniewski.
[10] After taking on increasing creative responsibilities,[9] Kneehigh Artistic directors Bill Mitchell and Mike Shepherd encouraged her to direct[11] and her first production, The Itch, was staged in 1999.
[13] While Rice's work did not always appease critics, Kneehigh's 'visually stunning, inventive, often subversive and unashamedly populist' shows toured in the UK and internationally.