Irish Theatre Summer Studio 2018

Five of our beloved graduate students, and one recently-graduated undergraduate, participated in the Irish Theatre Summer Studio, which took place over the summer from mid-July through early August. Angela, Alex E., Ashley, Michelle, Lia, and Caitlyn spent three and a half weeks in Dublin and Galway, and were joined by seven theater students, three from Villanova and four from University College Dublin. The program was led by Drs. Joseph Lennon and Valerie Joyce. Working in collaboration with the Lir Theatre, students participated in a variety of theater workshops (movement, voice, directing, devising, etc.) and were able to spend some time in small groups devoted to playwrighting. At the end of their time in Dublin, all Summer Studio students put on a performance of the “scenes” they had written during their time at the Lir. Along the way, students attended a variety of plays put on by the Abbey Theatre, he Gate Theatre, the Peacock, and the New Theatre. Our grad students also got to visit a variety of Ulysses-related places, including the Martello Tower in Sandycove, Sweny’s Pharmacy in the city center, and the James Joyce Centre.

In Galway, students got to spend some much-anticipated time in the Abbey Theatre archives, housed on NUI Galway’s campus. Students’ research varied from the Abbey’s staging of Sean O’Casey’s Juno and the Paycock during the Celtic Tiger, to historical and contemporary portrayals of Molly (from Ulysses) on stage, to critical reception of two different productions of the play Katie Roche. While there, some students also got to visit the beautiful Cliffs of Moher. Check out the highlight reel below! (Thanks to Michelle for the photos!)