After attending a women's comedy festival in Sydney Kate JasonSmith founded Hens' Teeth in time to debut just before Christmas in 1988.
Performers included: Ginette McDonald, Rima te Wiata, Emily Perkins, Cathy Sheat, Michelle Scullion, Ann Pacey, Riwia Brown, Ann Jones, Alison Wall, Pam Corkery, Perry Piercy, Nancy Fulford, Stephanie Creed, Vicki Walker, Donna Akersten, Jane Waddell, TV personality Chloe (Chloe Perovic), and Phylli JasonSmith.
The core cast included Lee Hatherly, Dame Kate Harcourt, Lorae Parry,[3] Pinky Agnew, Helen Moulder, Carmel McGlone, Sue Dunlop, Sally Rodwell, Madeline McNamara, Rose Beauchamp, Prue Langbein, Bub Bridger, April Phillips, and Darien Takle.
Hens' Teeth's success has been attributed to its focus on things that are part of the fabric of most women's lives: sex, politics, aging, cooking, ambition, breastfeeding, men, opera, housework, dieting, childcare, self-defense, love, money, contraception and creativity.
[5] In March 1990 Hens' Teeth was included in the biennial New Zealand International Festival of the Arts with the title Daughter of Hens’ Teeth with design by Debra Bustin and choreography by Jamie Bull; the performances were in the Illott Concert Chamber of the Wellington Town Hall;[6] music was by Michelle Scullion and performers included Sandra McKay, Madeline McNamara, Helen Moulder, Lorae Parry, and Sally Rodwell.
Moulder's part in the duo is an "aging diva" called Cynthia Fortitude; Beauchamp is Gertie, the long-suffering, generally mute, but piano-playing sidekick.
[4][16] Sally Rodwell published a book of monologues based on characters developed partly in Hens’ Teeth titled Gonne Strange Charity.
[17] Sally Rodwell and Madeline McNamara used Hens’ Teeth to explore characters of 'The Nobodies' which ended up being a show Crow Station that premiered in Wellington and then performed at the Magdalena Project women's festival in Cardiff in 1994.