Category Archives: On stage

May 11, 2012 · 11:32 am

MA Showcase

On a course called Drama and Theatre Studies, it’s probably not surprising that most of my MA classmates like being on stage. The course itself is a mix of theory and practical classes and most of the class took the practical classes – Ensemble Acting and Vocabularies of Theatre Composition. There was also a lot of involvement in NUIG DramSoc and six of the eight One Act plays were written, directed or performed by someone in the MADT class.

The idea to do a showcase for casting directors and agents came about when Maureen Hughes was speaking at the Town Hall Theatre’s Drama Day at the end of February. One of my classmates asked if she would come and see us if we did put on a showcase. Her advice was to book somewhere in Dublin, put on a lunchtime show and invite as many industry professionals as possible. That seemed possible; it even sounded like it might be fun. We were still considering the idea when we asked Mikel Murfi after a workshop if he had any suggestions of suitable scenes or plays. He was very enthusiastic about the idea and that helped us think that it was a good idea. As usual with things like this we had to push to get it started  but once we got things up and running, it started to take on a life of it’s own. (I usually find that happens around the time you book a venue and start inviting people. Putting down money is also a really good incentive to make things happen.)

We contacted a few venues and got a great price from Bewley’s Café Theatre. Our lunchtime show became an early-evening show. We held a cake-sale to raise money, got a bit of sponsorship and the university pitched in a little bit as well. We had a date and a venue and guest list. We even had money to pay for the whole thing. We just had to put together a show.

The trickiest part was figuring out which scenes to do. We needed things that could stand up on their own and also show our actors to the very best of their abilities. The cast consisted of nine women and four men and we had to find something for everybody. There were a couple of long sessions with piles of scripts, passing the books around, reading little bits, considering and rejecting and trying it different ways. Eventually we got twelve scenes with something for everyone. We juggled rehearsals around essay deadlines and slowly the show started to come together.

Last week it all became very real. On Tuesday we did an open dress rehearsal in the Bank of Ireland Theatre in college. It was the first time we did the whole show together and it was great to perform in front of an audience. It was also lovely that people took time out to come and see us and stick around to give feedback afterwards.

On Thursday we headed to Dublin for our busy day in Bewleys. They let us get in to the space at 10am in the morning, which was great because it was the first time a lot of people had been in the theatre. We had to leave at 12pm because there was a lunchtime show on but we were back for our get-in at 2.30pm for a show starting at 5pm. It was a little bit hectic!

The event itself was a huge success. We had a lovely audience who all seemed to enjoy themselves. Bewley’s looked after us very well. I really cannot fault their hospitality, even when there were 13 people warming up on the stairs they were lovely about it. The show went really smoothly too – no hiccups and everybody definitely upped their game on the night! There is a whole lot of talent in my class and I’m delighted that we got a chance to show it off. This was something that the class came together to do ourselves; it had nothing to do with our course. We all worked really hard on something that was entirely ours.

Afterwards we went out for dinner and then there was dancing and drinking in the hostel and a little bit of sing-song and it was a really nice way to end the year. Our first class trip was to Dublin in October for the Dublin Theatre Festival and this felt like a nice way to bookend the year.

I don’t know if anyone will get any work because of the showcase but it felt like a success to me. We’ve already got a good return on all our hard work!

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March 6, 2012 · 1:19 am

Theatre Week at NUIG

Theatre Week is over. It was fantastic. It was also stressful and exhausting and very busy but I loved it.

On Monday night I got to perform ‘My Angry Vagina’ (one of my favourite monologues) to an appreciative audience. I heard that Tuesday night’s audience were even more appreciative and over the two nights, we raised €1,300 for V-Day and the Galway Rape Crisis Centre. Well done to DramSoc and the Feminist Society for a great production.

The One Act Play Festival started at lunchtime on Wednesday. I had one play at lunchtime and one in the evening on Wednesday and Thursday. Then on Friday, there was the omnibus edition with all eight plays back-to-back to an almost sold out theatre. I thought it would be a long hard night but it actually flew by. I watched some plays and hide backstage with my nerves during others. It felt like it was over all too soon!

Over apart from the clean-up and the award ceremony! I like award ceremonies. I don’t know why, I just do. I like celebrations of work well done. I like seeing people happy and thanking the people who helped them along the way. I especially enjoyed Friday’s awards ceremony because so many of my hugely talented friends were recognised for being awesome. The last award of the evening was the writing award for Best Play, which was won by Mr. Patrick O’Byrne for Ahhhh Lad!!. He was shocked and surprised and I was proud as punch to have been involved. I loved my cast, I loved the script, I loved working with all these talented people.

Well done to everybody involved. There was a lovely atmosphere backstage and at the after-party on Friday. It was just a great group of people to hang out with and I had such a great time. I’m sorry it’s over and I have to come back to real life and start worrying about my coursework again!

The full list of awards can be found here.

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February 28, 2012 · 12:45 am

Busy Week

Theatre Week has just begun at NUIG. The first day included rehearsals for two different one act plays (I’m directing one and performing in another), and a performance of The Vagina Monologues.

Yes, V-Day is also upon us again! This year I am helping to raise money for the Galway Rape Crisis Centre. My performance is done, but you can still see the show at NUIG tomorrow at 7.30pm. Tomorrow night I will be seeing Rhinoceros in the Town Hall Theatre. The One Act Play series kicks off on Wednesday and there will be performances at lunchtime and in the evening, Wednesday – Friday. And to round off the week, on Saturday, I’m going to see Carthaginans at the Town Hall. It’s going to be a busy week and I know I will be wreaked by the end of it, but I also know it’s going to be a lot of fun. And because shows are actually opening this week, I think it will be less hectic week than last week.

Last Monday I had four separate rehearsals for three different shows, and a directing workshop with Garry Hynes (which I will write about soon, promise!), and the week continued like that! By the time Saturday rolls around, I will be more than ready for it!

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May 7, 2011 · 11:05 pm

Gay Theatre Festival

The Gay Theatre Festival started last weekend in venues all over Dublin. This weekend I am in one of those venues – tomorrow I am taking part in a rehearsed reading of Moving On, a brand new play by a brand new playwright Paul O’Beirne. It’s on in the Front Lounge tomorrow and 3pm and tickets are free! In fact, you don’t even need a ticket, just come along.

The Irish Theatre Shorts in the Cobalt Cafe have also been recommended to me. They are on every night from 8pm; four short plays for €15. And look out for Grace Kelley, who was part of The Vagina Monologue cast, in Saliva.

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April 12, 2011 · 10:44 pm

V-day minus one

I meant to write a lot more about The Vagina Monologues while we were putting the show together. I wanted to write about the auditions, the fundraising, the rehearsals, but I was too busy to write about it while it was all happening. Now the show is almost here days away and all the tickets are sold. Tomorrow afternoon, we’ll head down the The Sugar Club for some last minute preparations and before we know it, the big night will have arrived! I feel ready and excited and happy and tired.

I wanted to write something before the show because however things go tomorrow night, I am really glad I did this. I’m proud of my cast, who are amazing and have worked really hard, and I’m a little bit proud of myself too.

I had planned to submit an application to the Dublin Fringe Festival last month. I went along to the pre-application talks and workshops and then, about a week before the deadline I got a bad dose of The Fear. It completely paralysed me and meant I couldn’t do anything. I felt untalented and unimaginative. I couldn’t imagine anyone being interested in anything that came out of my brain. As well as doubting my creative abilities, I had no faith in my practical skills. I just didn’t believe I would be able for the work involved. I wouldn’t be able to organise a cast or crew, I wouldn’t be able to sell my show, I wouldn’t even be able to get it to the stage where it was ready to be seen by the general public. I felt I was too old to be submitting work to the festival, too old to be working in the arts at all. This idea of making new things was a young persons game – you needed to be young and optimistic and a little bit native to take that leap of faith and believe that you will be able to cope with the consequences.

Basically I let the little, doubting voice in my head convince me that submitting anything would be a colossal waste of time.

I mention this here because I had all those fears about The Vagina Monologues last January. I was really nervous signing up to do, I was worried I wouldn’t be able to look after all the different aspects involved – finding a venue, fundraising to pay for that venue, auditioning a cast, organising rehearsals and rehearsal space, organising publicity and ticket sales, etc. I wasn’t sure if I was up to it. I was afraid.

I’m not saying the last three months have been easy – they have been really hard work – but I managed to made things happen. And people were kind and supportive and helpful all along the way. I managed to surprise myself and that’s always nice. And once or twice a week, I got to hang out with an amazing group of women.

So maybe I’m not too old after all. In the future, I will ignore the doubting voice and have a little more faith in myself. It’s a lesson I needed to be reminded of, even though it’s one I know and have seen in evidence before. But it was a good reminder and one I will cling to in the future.

Tomorrow will be an exciting night and a happy night and the end of tiring three months that have made me very proud!

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October 4, 2010 · 10:40 pm

Trilogy reflection

Trilogy finished over a week ago now and it has taken me that long to write about it coherently enough to post here. I had a busy week catching up on real life, but I was also busy trying to unpack all my thoughts on Trilogy that have been stacked on top of each other inside my brain for the last week or so.

I volunteered for Trilogy for lots of reasons – I like being onstage, I wanted to challenge myself to be onstage naked and I wanted to be involved in this life-affirming feminist performance. It became about more than the performance though because so much of the experience happened off-stage. Our dance lasted less than 10 minutes each night but we had four three-hour rehearsals to prepare for it. These sessions were more than just dance rehearsals; they gave us an opportunity to get to know each other and to figure out what had drawn us to this project in the first place. It was a chance met other brave women and maybe find another way of looking at the world.

And it did change people. All week, when we sat down to talk about how we were feeling on that particular day, women talked about the revelations they had had since starting the process and the way it was changing how they saw the world. I didn’t feel changed. My biggest revelation was that I was surprised how easy it was to dance naked once you got over the initial shock.

Then on the Friday night, I saw the show and something shifted for me. I was really hyper after the performance, I wanted to talk to everyone about everything, I was excited and giddy.

Troligy is a very feminist play. Part One begins with some quotes from The Female Eunuch by Germaine Greer and ends with that naked, celebratory dance by women who aren’t embarrassed or ashamed by their bodies or the ways they jiggle! Part Two is a reaction to Town Bloody Hall – a debate in 1971 between leading feminists and famous misogynist Norman Mailer. They play lots of clips from the recording of the debate and I loved the passion that was displayed by those women from long ago. What was going on onstage in the present was also wonderful. There was lots of beautiful movement sections, and some really moving monologues. The third part is an introduction to Make Your Own Herstory, a web-based project that is taking feminism into the future.

This wonderful feminist play made me feel that all my thoughts on feminism aren’t out-dated and out-of-step with the world around me, that there are other people who feel the same way, that are looking for a community and a way to move things forward. And that made me happy. At one point, my over-whelming thought was ‘I love theatre!’. It just bubbled up in me and made me grin. I felt happy to be there experiencing this wonderful work that these people had spent so much time and care into creating. I felt lucky to be there to see the work, and lucky to have experience working with the people onstage and be involved, in a very small way, in creating it.

The next day I felt like Trilogy had started me on some sort of journey. I’m not sure where it’s going to lead but I feel like it’s going to be more of a creative journey than a purely feminist one and I’m really interested to see where I end up.

My Trilogy experience wasn’t “life-changing” in some big, dramatic way, but I think that week did change me. Since then, throughout the last week, I have had moments when I feel like I can do anything I want with my life, that there’s nothing stopping me having the life I want. Nic talked about the play having an effect on those we saw it, and that it would go on to cause ripples in the wider community. I hope that’s true but I think for the women who took part, it will have a slightly bigger effect. I feel like Nic has lit a power-keg under each of us; we don’t know yet how long the fuse is or how much gun-powder is loaded but eventually there are going to be lots of explosions from all these wonderful women.

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If you would like to experience it all yourself, and if you happen to be in Belfast, you can! Trilogy is on at the Waterfront as part of the Belfast Festival and they are looking for volunteers. More details here.

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September 23, 2010 · 5:04 pm

One down, three to go!

I was feeling very nervous arriving at the theatre yesterday evening. I had butterflies in my stomach and I actually felt a little bit sick. It was nice to check in with the other women and find out how everyone else was feeling. I felt better after we did a couple of quick run-throughs. And then suddenly it was time to get in positions and open the doors to the audience.

We had a final pre-show pep-talk after the last run-through. Standing on stage, in a circle, naked, it was really nice to really see all the different bodies. When we’re bopping around on stage I’m usually too concentrating on the steps to see people. It’s amazing how quickly this nakedness has become normal. Last night, Nic was giving direction to the stage manager. But she was naked.

The actual performance was amazingly, a lot less scary than I expected it to be. The most nerve-racking part for me was standing in the wings listening to the audience coming into the theatre. At that point, it really feels like there is no turning back but once the show actually started, my nerves calmed down almost immediately and I felt ready to go onstage!

And it was great. Much easier than I was expecting. I was aware of the audience as a whole but not really as individuals and it was over much too soon. I think the audience enjoyed our little dance though I haven’t been talking to anyone about it.

I’ve heard a couple of people saying great things about the show. One was an e-mail from a work colleague that was waiting for me when I came into work this morning!

And now, I’m off to the theatre again. To another sold-out show. If you’re thinking about coming to see it, get your tickets now from http://www.fringefest.com/event/trilogy.

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September 22, 2010 · 5:14 pm

Trilogy Rehearsals

We had our last Trilogy rehearsal last night. It was in the Project Arts Centre where we will be performing. It was a full dress and tech rehearsal. We called it our Undress Rehearsal and it went really well. The show opens tonight and the first night is completely sold out. I will be naked in front of a lot of people tonight. I’m nervous but not totally freaking out.

My body is sore from all the dancing which is fast and energetic. I tried to run for a bus last night and got about two yards before my legs started to cramp up. Being naked with the rest of women is no longer a big deal. Nic and the rest of the women organising it, were very gentle when it came to slowly getting us out of our clothes. It was done in stages with people setting their own pace. The heat in the room and all the dancing helped. It made sense to take off a couple of layers of clothes when you are so hot and sweaty! They made nakedness normal and fun! Everybody should do the hokey-cokey naked at least once in their lives.

I’m really enjoying the whole experience. In a way, I’m looking forward to getting onstage tonight because I want to get the first night over with. Once I know what it actually feels like to be naked in front of an audience like that, it will be easier to relax and enjoy it.

If you’re thinking about coming to see the show, get your tickets fast! As I said, tonight is completely and the other three nights are selling fast.

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September 19, 2010 · 6:01 pm

Trilogy

Last night I went to my first Trilogy rehearsal. There were 30-40 women sitting around a room, feeling nervous and a little apprehensive. None of us really knew what to expect, what we would be doing over the next 3 hours or if we’d actually be able to go through with the final (naked) performance.

The organisers, Nic Green and her cast, were very gentle with us. We started out sitting in a circle, introducing ourselves, explaining why we were there and what had drawn us to the project. There were lots of different reasons. Women had come along to confront their own body-demons or to celebrate their bodies because they felt they finally felt good in their own skin. A lot of people said it was because dancing naked on stage was a good way to challenge themselves, others because they liked to be naked in a non-sexual environment and this felt like a rare and wonderful opportunity to do that. There were women who wanted to just do something crazy or who wanted to work with other women. A lot of people said how nervous they were, that they weren’t really sure why they were there.

I think I covered some of my own reasons in an earlier post; because I felt it was an interesting thing to get involved in, because the show sounded like something I would be really interested in. That’s why I sent off the e-mail to Kate saying “yeah, I’ll do that.” I think I was actually there last night, just to prove to myself a little bit that I can do this.

I am really nervous about being naked on stage, not because I have a problem with how I look naked but because I feel it will make me vunerable. The Project is a reasonably big venue and Dublin is a pretty small town. It’s very likely that I will meet people afterwards who will have seen the show, and I’m not sure how I feel about that.

So, yes I’m nervous, but I’m not backing out. And there are lots of reasons that I am determined to do this; 1) I’d feel like such a coward if I gave up and I got a couple of friends from roller derby to sign-up to do it too which is an added motivation to stick with it; 2) I know that I will feel really proud of myself for doing it and 3) the rehearsal yesterday was the most incredible fun! The dance is fun and lively, the song we’re dancing to is fantastic and it looked brilliant. Everyone in the room was having a great time.

After we introduced ourselves, we did a quick, silly warm-up and then started learning the dance. We all stayed fully clothed yesterday and just concentrated on learning the steps and getting to know each other. It was a really great three hours. I left the rehearsal yesterday really buzzing from all the dancing and all the great women I’d meet. I miss working in a group like that. I’m heading out to the second rehearsal now. I’m not sure if we’ll be expected to get naked today, but I’m looking forward to it anyway.

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July 19, 2010 · 10:07 pm

Would you like to dance naked on stage as part of the Fringe Festival?

A couple of weeks the Fringe Festival put out a call for women who would be like to participate in a show called ‘Trilogy’. The show is about modern-day feminism and was created by a woman called Nic Green.

From the Fringe website:
“Women of all ages, backgrounds, shapes, sizes, levels of fitness and ability are sought to perform naked in an ensemble dance celebrating the female form, as part of Nic Green’s extraordinary, multi award winning show Trilogy during this year’s ABSOLUT Fringe.

A show in three parts, Trilogy is a celebratory venture into modern-day feminism and examines and interrogates the joys and complexities of being a woman today.”

I think it sounds like a really interesting experience and have already signed up! Even though it may interfere with volunteering for the festival, I think it would be worth it! In the Guardian, Lynn Gardner describes Trilogy (at the Edinburgh fringe festival last year) as angry, joyous, heartfelt, rigorous and radiant with hope. That’s my kind of show!

It looks like it would be a fairly big commitment – evening rehearsals are from September 18th to 21st and then performances will take place from September 22nd to 25th – but you can come along to the first information evening (where everybody keeps their clothes on!) and see how you feel about it. Nic Green says on the website above; “If you want to come to the first session (which we will do fully clothed!) and decide you don’t want to come back that is of course absolutely fine and we will fully understand. However, if you feel at all interested I would urge you to come along and see what you think and how you feel.”

Another Guardian article about the show in Edinburgh talks to the volunteers who took part and they are all very positive about the experience. And from my own experience, I can tell you that the Fringe knows how to look after its volunteers!

If you’re interested in taking part, or just finding out more, contact Kate at kate@fringefest.com and maybe I’ll see you there!

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