Now I'm dead there'll be changes. I won't keep rolling over. I won't wag my tail at every insult and injury! Kathleen Duggan has rushed home to Ireland upon hearing the news that her mother, Maisie, has died. Only when she gets back to the house, she finds that her mother is alive and well. Almost. However, after a routine car accident, Maisie believes that she is now dead and wandering around the homestead, awaiting her funeral. Still able to talk to her childish adult son and her violent, temperamental husband, she will no longer be silenced by the male-dominated, pugnacious atmosphere that has kept her quiet all these years. So when Kathleen comes back for the 'funeral', Maisie expects to find her final resting place, safe from the threat of domestic violence once and for all. The Remains of Maisie Duggan received its world premiere on the Peacock stage of the Abbey Theatre, Dublin, in autumn 2016.

This Handbook offers a multiform sweep of theoretical, historical, practical and personal glimpses into a landscape roughly characterised as contemporary Irish theatre and performance. Bringing together a spectrum of voices and sensibilities in each of its four sections — Histories, Close-ups, Interfaces, and Reflections — it casts its gaze back across the past sixty years or so to recall, analyse, and assess the recent legacy of theatre and performance on this island. While offering information, overviews and reflections of current thought across its chapters, this book will serve most handily as food for thought and a springboard for curiosity. Offering something different in its mix of themes and perspectives, so that previously unexamined surfaces might come to light individually and in conjunction with other essays, it is a wide-ranging and indispensable resource in Irish theatre studies.

Fifteen years of disconnected sparks to do the damage. To stop her beautiful fantastical brain from working. 'Fall in love in my early 20s, get married in my late 20s, have at least one child by the time I'm 30. F*ck!' Life is hard to navigate when you've got so many questions. Can I put this jumper in the washing machine? Do you have my birth certificate? Where did you find love? How did you do it? How do you survive? A story of a kamikaze love affair with unexpected consequences. Hilarious and heartbreaking, written by Jessica Butcher and with original music by Anoushka Lucas. Sparks is a two-hander musical about the brain's response to grief. This edition was published to coincide with the run at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in August 2018, ahead of its transfer to the HighTide Festivals 2018 in Aldeburgh, Suffolk and Walthamstow, London.

Irish Theatre in the Twenty-First Century is the first in-depth study of the subject. It analyses the ways in which theatre in Ireland has developed since the 1990s when emerging playwrights Martin McDonagh, Conor McPherson, and Enda Walsh turned against the tradition of lyrical eloquence with a harsh and broken dramatic language. Companies such as Blue Raincoat, the Corn Exchange, and Pan Pan pioneered an avant-garde dramaturgy that no longer privileged the playwright. This led to new styles of production of classic Irish works, including the plays of Synge, mounted in their entirety by Druid. The changed environment led to a re-imagining of past Irish history in the work of Rough Magic and ANU, plays by Owen McCafferty, Stacey Gregg, and David Ireland, dramatizing the legacy of the Troubles, and adaptations of Greek tragedy by Marina Carr and others reflecting the conditions of modern Ireland. From 2015, the movement #WakingTheFeminists led to a sharpened awareness of gender. While male playwrights showed a toxic masculinity on the stage, a generation of female dramatists including Carr, Gregg, and Nancy Harris gave voice to the experiences of women long suppressed in conservative Ireland. For three separate periods, 2006, 2016, 2020-2, the author served as one of the judges for the Irish Times Irish Theatre Awards, attending all new productions across the island of Ireland. This allowed him to provide the detailed overview of the 'state of play' of Irish theatre in each of those times which punctuate the book as one of its most innovative features. Drawing also on interviews with Ireland's leading theatre makers, Grene provides readers with a close-up understanding of Irish theatre in a period when Ireland became for the first time a fully modernized, secular, and multi-ethnic society.

A destitute farmer sells his land to the supermarket chain that drove him out of business. Fifteen years later and a bustling supermarket stands on the same spot. UK managing director Tony is coming to work undercover at the store for a week. Branch manager Vicky is determined to give him a more grimly authentic experience than he'd ever dared wish for. Shelf-stacker Josh dreams of escape and rock stardom. Union organiser Elliot dreams of Josh. By Friday, nothing will ever be the same for them again. Happy to Help is an acerbic comedy about how Britain has become a nation of shop assistants. This programme text edition was first published to coincide with the world premiere of the play at Park Theatre, London, in June 2016.

LOOK ME IN THE EYE AND TELL ME YOU'LL NEVER LEAVE ME. A woman wakes up with a stranger beside her. A student argues with his lover. A single mother fights to feed her baby. A married man flirts with two younger women. And far away, one devastating event is about to change all their lives forever. Artistic Director Sarah Frankcom says goodbye to the Royal Exchange with an extraordinary new play by Simon Stephens, with original music by Jarvis Cocker. Connecting five relatives in five disparate English towns, from Blackpool to Durham, LIGHT FALLS is a richly layered play about life in the face of death, about how our love survives us after we've gone – and about how family, community and kindness help the North survive.

The spiritual rebellion of Stephen Dedalus and his restless search for self-expression is brought to life in a thrilling theatrical adaptation by Arthur Riordan. Based upon James Joyce's novel of the same name, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man is a reworking of the classic coming-of-age story. Charting Stephen's transformation into a man, we follow him through the major milestones and stumbling blocks of his life: his school days, his first romance, his loss of faith and finally to his initiation into the world of writing. In Arthur Riordan's witty and poignant adaptation of 'Joyce's manifesto', A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man challenges perceptions of family, homeland, and the Catholic Church. This edition of the adaptation was published to coincide with Rough Magic's world premiere of the production at the Dublin Theatre Festival in autumn 2018.