I’m currently in a very cool and lucky position where I’m doing double duty on two amazing initiatives during Dublin Theatre Festival (a pure waiting for a bus scenario if there ever was one). I’m currently neck deep in The Next Stage programme which has put me on the most intense theatre bootcamp ever over the past week and a half, and there’s still another week to go! Physically, I’m in bits but mentally, I’ve never been more inspired by theatre and have never been more motivated to get better at making it. I will be full of big fat tears when it’s over.

On top of that theatre orgy, I’ve also been on the Play On playwriting initiative with Dublin Theatre Festival since June and I found out last week that my contribution to that is one of the six plays that will receive a rehearsed reading this week. War Of Attrition was a play that myself and Angela Barrett started devising during Devious Theatre’s In The Future When All’s Well residency in 2011 (along with Night Of The Living Dead and John Kennedy’s Phantasm). Originally it was a two hander about a misunderstanding between an average Joe and a street charity worker, but like the story itself, the idea escalated. We developed it further and what we have now is a dark comedy about accountability and the nature of competition in a country where opportunities decrease by the day. Essentially, it’s about young Irish people being pitted against each other. It’s got a similar politics and violence vibe to my last play Scratcher but whereas that was about what it takes to start a revolution this one is a little bit smaller in scale, but hopefully bigger in ideas. As it stands, it’s a long way off being finished but a rehearsed reading this week will definitely help me identify the work I need to do to it. It’s a cool opportunity and one I’m excited about, even though I am fucking terrified about having presented in front of people. If you would like to see the play in its earliest stages, it will get its reading at Play On, this Wednesday October 10th at 1pm in Project Arts Centre. It’s all free but booking is advised… or so I’ve been told. You can grab tickets for it on the Dublin Theatre Festival website and also at their box office on 01 677 8899.

There’s plans in place for Devious Theatre to produce it next year but I’m not throwing the cart before the horse so we’ll see how it goes. This theatre programming lark is getting harder and harder to pin down every year. I’ve now written 6 full length plays and the first three have been produced (Heart Shaped Vinyl, Smitten and Scratcher) and the last three haven’t (this along with Bansheeville and Punctured) so my batting average is down. But the last three have been developed with Barnstorm, Fishamble and now Dublin Theatre Festival respectively so hopefully it will mean that the quality average is up! If not, I need to find something else to do.

Poetry… I hear poetry is good.

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