[Playing] the Maids
31 August/1 September 2013
Work in progress showings
a collaboration between
THE LLANARTH GROUP (Wales, U.K.), GAITKRASH (Cork, Republic of Ireland), and THEATRE P'YUT (Seoul, Korea).
[Playing] the Maids is not a production of Genet's text, but a response to the opportunities, relationships, and dynamics offered by Genet's inherently meta-theatrical source text - a visually rich, flamboyant, fast-moving, poignant, multi-media encounter with what lies within. [Playing] the Maids will be performed by a five woman ensemble working multi-linguistically between English, Korean, and Mandarin, accompanied by two on-stage musicians.
The artistic team includes:
Director: Phillip Zarrilli, LLANARTH GROUP (Wales) Dramaturg: Kaite O'Reilly, LLANARTH GROUP (Wales)
Soundscape/environment: Mick O'Shea, GAITKRASH, assisted by guest musician/cellist, Adrian Curtin (Ireland/UK) Choreographers: Jing Hong Kuo, LLANARTH GROUP (Singapore), and Jeungsook Yoo (traditional Korean dance, THEATRE P'YUT) The Chinese Madame: Jing Hong Kuo (LLANARTH GROUP, from Singapore)
The Irish Sisters: Regina Crowley (Claire) and Bernie Cronin (Solange) (GAITKRASH) The Korean Sisters: Jeungsook Yoo (Claire) and Sunhee Kim (Solange) (THEATRE P'YUT)
Work in progress showings will take place at
Tyn Y Parc Studio, Ceredigion, on Saturday 31st August and
Y Lloft, Chapter Arts Centre, Cardiff, on Sunday 1st September.
With regret, the venues are not fully accessible.
Showings are free, not open to the general public, and available by invitation only by contactingp.zarrilli@exeter.ac.uk
Told by the Wind
1-16 November 2013
exchange/interaction/performance
We are very pleased to announce the forthcoming exchange, interaction, collaboration between Phillip Zarrilli, Artistic Director of The Llanarth Group, resident dramaturg/playwright, Kaite O'Reilly, and Okamura Yojiro, Artistic Director of AMI Theatre Company, Tokyo, Japan, and members of their two companies. With initial funding from Wales Arts International, amongst other sources, an initial two week exchange/interaction will take place in Tokyo between the two companies from 1-16 November, 2013. The exchange/interaction will include performances of The Llanarth Group's Told by the Wind, performance of a new play by Okamura Yojiro, workshop exchanges, and planning toward a collaborative production in 2014 between the two companies. The year-long exchange/collaborative process is part of a celebration of the 400th anniversary of Japan-British relations.
Phillip Zarrilli and Jo Shapland in Told by the Wind co-created by Kaite O'Reilly, Phillip Zarrilli, and Jo Shapland
Aminadab is a theatrical arrangement of "L'Arret de mort"
written by Maurice Blanchot, whom actor-director Okamura Yojiro admires.
Fragile:
Symposium. Dance, Arts & visual impairment
20 – 21 April 2013
Tallinn University, Estonia. www.fragiledance.com
20 Tiny Plays about Sheffield. Mon 8 – Sat 13 April 2013 20 Tiny Plays. 1 big city. A theatrical experience unique to Sheffield, including Shim shams for blind hummer bees, Kaite's 5 minute choral piece for 50 voices, aged 15 – 85.
International Voices Project: The Almond and the Seahorse will be presented at Victory Gardens Theatre, Chicago, on March 17 2013, directed by Sandy Shinner, as part of the International Voices Project.
Purcell Room, Southbank Centre.
31 August 2012, 6.30pm
1 September, 2pm
1 September, 7.30pm
A provocative look at the human body with dynamic staging that combines movement and live projections, Kaite O'Reilly's poetic, poignant and at times explosively funny texts are performed by a cast of six leading Deaf and Disabled performers with direction by John E McGrath and movement by Nigel Charnock. This radical, athletic production from National Theatre Wales celebrates the athleticism, diversity and skill of the company, whilst exploring the endless possibilities of human difference.
In Water I'm Weightless is an Unlimited Commission for the Cultural Olympiad.
Kaite will also be leading a workshop at Southbank Centre, and participating in various panel events as part of Unlimited/the Cultural Olympiad. For information, please go to:
24 May – 2 June 2012, 7.45 pm
Matinees: 2.15pm, 31 May & 2.15pm, 2 June
at Crucible Studio Theatre
55 Norfolk Street, Sheffield, S1 1DA
0114 249 6000
How far would you go to be the best?
What if bio-engineered body parts and medical science were on tap to make you leaner, faster and stronger?
Would you fight it; or embrace the brave new world?
A darkly humorous and provocative theatre experience which explores the limits of what human means.
Written by Kaite O'Reilly (winner of the Ted Hughes Award for Poetry 2010), directed by Andrew Loretto, designed by Shanaz Gulzar.
LeanerFasterStronger is a Chol Theatre and Sheffield Theatres coproduction.
imove video interview with Kaite O'Reilly on Leaner Faster Stronger.
Kaite O'Reilly wins the 2010 Ted Hughes Award for her new version of Aeschylus's Persians for National Theatre Wales.
photo by
Hayley Madden
"Poetry crosses time, the old play becomes the new poetry. Here's the truth of language colliding with the clichés of politics and the advertisement of war. This verse play is entertainment, challenge and a lie detector."
Judges of the Ted Hughes Award
Kaite is delighted to have been awarded an Unlimited Commission from the Cultural Olympiad, part of the celebrations for the 2012 London Games
The 'd' Monologues will be a dramatic collection of monologues written by Kaite for Deaf and disabled performers, inspired by the stories and experiences of disabled and deaf individuals across the whole of the UK.
Working with The Llanarth Group, she hopes to produce a body of work that will address the dearth of pieces written from a disabled perspective, and parts written for disabled performers. The D Monologues will be performed in venues in Wales and across the UK.
directed by Kirstie Davis
opens 24 March 2011 Forest Forge
Always the extra, never the star... Alfa, Beaty and Coral - three performers bicker, heckle and share juicy tales of sex, lies and recipes, whilst around them an epic production unfolds. The anti-heroines are gradually stripped of all pretence, their darkly comic and devastating truths uncovered.
A triumph in its initial productions by Graeae Theatre at London's Soho Theatre and Edinburgh Assembly Rooms, Peeling gives audiences a unique and compelling experience as it cunningly interweaves audio description and sign language.
Told by the Wind – ON TOUR in Chicago, USA, May 2011
Created by Kaite O’Reilly, Jo Shapland, and Phillip Zarrilli
Artistic Consultants: Mari Boyd (Tokyo) and Peader Kirk (London)
“...hypnotic...a haunting painterly beauty...[with] the astringent purity of a haiku poem... intense meditation in movement...the performers have a remarkable presence.”
Elisabeth Mahoney, THE GUARDIAN **** Feb 2010
Two figures, two lives, multiple time spaces: TOLD BY THE WIND is a new performance of movement and text that ‘dances’ an inner landscape. Inspired by East Asian and ‘post-dramatic’ aesthetics, stories are evoked and told by embodied silences, splintered interactions, and slowed down motion.
Transformative and multi-layered, TOLD is informed by Japanese Theatre of Quietude and String Theory [Quantum physics]. Intimate and meditative, it is a requiem for the unseen; a poignant duet for two figures who never physically meet.
directed by Mike Pearson
August 2010 National Theatre of Wales
Kaite O'Reilly was delighted to be involved in the inaugural year of the National Theatre of Wales, commissioned to write a new version of Aeschylus's 'The Persians' – the first play in the Western theatrical canon. Working with an outstanding creative team including director Mike Pearson, the site-specific production took place on Military of Defence land in the wilderness of the Brecon Beacons – where soldiers rehearse battle before entering the theatre of war.
Read more at the website of the National Theatre Wales here.
Read about 'The Persians' in the blog of te National Theatre Community: blog one and blog two.
See the reviews of The Times, The Guardian, The Observer and the The Telegraph here.
By Aeschylus In a new version by Kaite O'Reilly Directed by Mike Pearson Conceptual design by Mike Brookes Designed by Simon Banham Music by John Hardy
Publications One of Kaite’s monologues has been accepted into the upcoming International Centre for Women Playwrights Mother/Daughter Monologue Book(s).
ICWP: The International Centre for Women Playwrights www.womenplaywrights.org
Kaite was a contributor in the Disability arts and culture edition of Research in Drama Education - The Journal of Applied Theatre and Performance. Her article, ‘Alternative Dramaturgies, a Playwright’s Perspective’ comments on dramaturgical innovations and developments informed by the playwright’s experience of impairment.
09 Susan Smith Blackburn Prize Finalists Announced
Kaite O'Reilly has been announced as one of the finalists in the international Susan Smith Blackburn Prize. The prestigious playwriting award, now entering its fourth decade, are given annually to recognize women from around the world who have written works of outstanding quality for the English-speaking theatre.
The international panel of judges for the 2009 Susan Smith Blackburn Prize awards includes Pulitzer prize winning playwright Edward Albee, noted British playwright and director Peter Gill, director and award winning playwright Emily Mann, Genista McIntosh, Executive Director of the Royal National Theatre and Sigourney Weaver.
Each year artistic directors and prominent professionals in the theatre throughout the English-speaking world are asked to submit plays. 'The Almond and the Seahorse' was nominated from both sides of the Atlantic - by Victory Gardens, Chicago, who developed the script, and Sherman Cymru, Cardiff, who mounted the first production.
Publications: Phillip B Zarrilli's Psychophysical Acting: an intercultural approach after Stanislavski
Foreword by Eugenio Barba
interactive DVD by Peter Hulton
Areas of focus include:
a historical overview of a psychophysical aaproach to acting from Stanislavski to the present
acting as an 'eneregetics' of performance applied to a wide range of playwrights: Samuel Beckett, Martin Crimp, Sarah Kane, Kaite O'Reilly and Ota Shogo
a system of training through yoga and Asian martial arts
The Almond and the Seahorse
by Kaite O'Reilly (directed by Phillip Zarrilli)
"Unmissable drama...Tremendous... extraordinary scenarios are tenderly drawn and powerfully realised in Phillip Zarrilli's beautifully judged production." ***** The Guardian
“A powerful drama, beautifully written…”
The British Theatre Guide
“A fascinating work, totally engaging…”
**** Western Mail
“…Wonderful…a masterly and captivating performance…writing with such sensitive beauty and delicate understanding….what real theatre is all about.”
Michael Kelligan Theatre Wales website
Further information and full reviews, click here Almond and the Seahorse Plays (coming soon).
Bora Bistrah: an international intercultural project by BBC Radio 3 to commemorate the 60th Anniversary of Partition and the creation and independence of India and Pakistan.
Kaite was one of five writers from all over the world commissioned to write about the Pakistani diaspora from specific localities: Bradford, Beijing, Nairobi, Karachi and Detroit. Kaite’s contribution, American Born Confused Desi was based on research and interviews with Pakistani immigrants in Detroit and Chicago undertaken when she was in the American Midwest earlier this year.
The play was transmitted at 8pmon BBC Radio 3 Sunday 19th August 2007. Directed by Shabina Aslam
Kaite has been awarded a 2007 writing bursary from Y Academi, the Wales-based literature agency, in order to complete her first novel.
PUBLICATIONS: Face on
Disability Arts in Ireland and Beyond
edited by Kaite O'Reilly
An international publication exploring Disability and Deaf arts and culture in an Irish context.
“Face On is a milestone for the disability arts movement in Ireland, a crucial point of reference in a shifting landscape”
Fintan O’Toole, critic, journalist and cultural commentator
“…a wonderful book…”
Geof Armstrong, Director National Disability Arts Forum, UK
"On a landmark disability arts publication"
Chris Tally Evans, New Welsh Review. See the full article here.
You can as well have a look at the New Welsh Review ("On a landmark disability arts publication") by Chris Tally Evans here.
Featuring 24 contributions from key thinkers and artists from the disciplines of visual art, dance, theatre, literature, film and comedy, Face On presents cultural and political commentary, poetry, academic essays, life writing, extracts from existing scripts and a wealth of visual art.
To order copies of Face On, Price €15/£10
Contact: Katrina Goldstone at Create
telephone +353-1-4736600
e-mail: communications@create-ireland.ie
A Memorial of Scattered Bodies: Alternative Dramaturgies informed by a d/Deaf and Disability Perspective
is an essay by Kaite in the eleventh volume of The Open Page issue 11, journal of the Magdalena Project - Women Theatre Practice
A journal of women's thoughts,
questions and visions for theatre
"Cripping up is the twenty-first century's answer to blacking up":
Conversation with Kaite O'Reilly on theatre, feminism and disability',
Gender Forum, vol. 12. (2005) http://www.genderforum.uni-koeln.de
An analysis of 'Peeling' in Jozefina Komporaly's recent publication
"Staging Motherhood: British Women Playwrights, 1956 to the Present" - Palgrave, ISBN 1-4039-9909-0.
