Mike Bartlett’s razor sharp play about love and longing provides us with questions of who we are and who we want to be. John’s refusal to fix his identity disturbs and disrupts the lives of those around him in this contemporary tale of sex without nudity and struggle without violence. Mike Bartlett’s punchy story takes a playful, candid look at one man’s sexuality and the difficulties that arise when you realise you have a choice.
Cock premiered at the Royal Court Theatre, London, on 13 November 2009.
WRITTEN BY Mike Bartlett
DIRECTED BY Katie O’Halloran
PRODUCERS Muirenn Lyons & Sarah Wiley
COSTUME DESIGN BY Sarah T Mooney
STAGE MANAGEMENT BY Sarah T Mooney
CAST Claire Gleeson, Joseph Ryan Warner, Padraic Mc Ginley and Séan Mc Manus
Curse of the Starving Class is a darkly comic exploration of the American family psyche.
The play examines the four members of the Tate family who live on a Californian farm in the 1970s, as they are threatened by the loss of their home to debt and developers. Exploitation wears the mask of "progress" and hardship begins to infect interactions between family members, eroding their capacity for mutual understanding. Tensions rise as the Tates wrestle with their individual and collective identities, the effects of intergenerational trauma and the American Dream that has left them hungry for more.
Katie directed the music video for Molly Donnery’s song “She Hates Me in the Morning”. The video stars Pattie Maguire and Shane O’Regan. It was shot in Roundwood House in Co. Laois, Ireland.
DOP: Naoise Kettle
Editor: Douglas Reddan
Colourist: Patrick Corr
Producer: Grace Donnery
Katie directed the music video for Molly Donnery’s song “Pull Me Under”. The video stars Pattie Maguire and Peter Newington. It was shot in Roundwood House in Co. Laois, Ireland.
DOP: Naoise Kettle
Editor: Douglas Reddan
Colourist: Patrick Corr
Producer: Grace Donnery
Katie directed the music video for Molly Donnery’s song “Intro”. The video stars Pattie Maguire. It was shot in Co. Laois, Ireland.
DOP: Naoise Kettle
Editor: Douglas Reddan
Colourist: Patrick Corr
Producer: Grace Donnery
Katie directed the music video for the song "Goodnight Sexy People" by Ben Bix (ft. Nevvv and Little O). The video was shot in Dublin with special thanks to Pawn Shop and Wigwam.
Full article by Fault Magazine here.
Happy Capital is a new play written and performed by Tommy Harris. The show was developed at Fringe Lab and Scene + Heard with support from the Irish Theatre Institute.
Mark is determined to become Ireland's first crypto-billionaire, despite not knowing what it is or how it works. Stuck in a dead-end job and living in Cork City with his grandfather who is chronically addicted to betting on (dead) horses and his scheming Uncle Larry. Mark Googles his way down rabbit holes of Ted Talks, crypto conventions, and endless greed, where the only thing holding him back is how low he’ll sink to make his dream come true.
Anthony Neilson’s The Wonderful World of Dissocia is a playground of bizarre encounters, where humour and surrealism masks a deeper struggle.
Lisa Jones tumbles into a fantastical land filled with unforgettable characters, hilarious situations, and moments of dark and poignant reflection. This thought-provoking play explores the complexities of mental health with a unique blend of humour and heart.
Eden Hotel by Emilie Hetland is Volya Theatre's most recent play currently undergoing development directed by Katie O'Halloran. The play follows the events of Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht's murders at the Eden Hotel in 1919 Berlin. The show explores their politics, personal lives and the brutality they suffered on January 15, 1919 through a Weimar Republic cabaret and silent film-inspired style.
Photos by Fredrik Lillegraven at the Tou Scene development in Stavanger, Norway.
In Vitro is a new play by Aoife O’Connor which follows Lily and Sam, a queer couple in Dublin who are looking to start a family. From financial imbalances, looking for the perfect donor, housing concerns and a sperm counseling session that doesn’t go as planned, tensions begin to bubble. Both women come to realise their relationship is not as happy as it once was, bringing to light class issues and financial stress between the two. They begin to see that going through the IVF process together in Ireland isn’t as easy as they had originally thought. In Vitro is a heartfelt, funny, impactful play that explores a same sex couple’s journey to parenthood in today’s Ireland.
Katie directed four short productions as part of the NEST/SOAR Spréacha Festival with Draíocht in Blanchardstown, Dublin. Three of the productions were theatre pieces performed by Pippa Molony, Kwaku Fortune and Jody O’Neill, and the fourth production was a dance piece choreographed by Monica Munoz and performed by LA Feeney.
Katie directed Hamlet at dlr Mill Theatre in Dublin, which opened on 5 October 2023. The design team for the production included Lou Dunne (set & costume), Colin Dorian (lighting) and Cameron Macaulay (sound).
Katie directed Revolutionary by Emilie Hetland at Stavanger Konserthus this April in Stavanger, Norway. This production featured an international cast and the play depicts the life and politics of Russian revolutionary, Alexandra Kollontai. Read more about the production here.
Katie was selected as a studio director with the Irish National Opera. She worked with the company throughout their 22/23 season.
The studio makes an annual selection of operatic talent in Ireland — singers, répétiteurs, conductors, directors, composers — and provides specially tailored training, professional mentoring and high-level professional engagements for a group of individuals whose success will be key to the future development of opera in Ireland.
The Perfect Immigrant by Samuel Yakura
What else does a young Black man have to say if it isn’t about racism?
Too busy trying to be an adult, leaving Nigeria and settling in Ireland, he has to find a way to hold on to both worlds.
With a story woven through prose and poetry, you will shift in your seat as you are teased with the discomfort of this immigrant settling into a new land. Take sides as loyalty to home is torn by the promise of the new.
But the real question is, where do you buy a hot pepper in Lucan?
This project is part of Weft, funded by the Arts Council/An Chomhairle Ealaíon through the Open Call initiative for 2021. Developed with the support of Fishamble's New Play Clinic.
The Pendulum Moon is a ghost story about early 20th-century Irish immigrants putting down roots in Summit Hill, a coal-mining town in Pennsylvania. As the daughter waits for her father to return, anxiety and monotony become dark fancies. Her mother, seemingly more practical, veers into the realm of superstition: signs that, this night, her husband will not return from the mines.
Druid Debuts offers a unique opportunity to experience brand new plays fresh off the page and to share an open discussion with the writer, director and cast.
Each summer, the selected playwrights are provided with professional support, a director, cast and space in which to develop their script to a rehearsed reading level. After the reading, audience feedback is invited as a means of further development.
Tír na nÓg is a new bilingual musical by Shauna Carrick with additional music by Aidan Byrne. It flips the well-known story on its head, bringing Niamh Cinn Óir into the spotlight to tell her version of events.
The story of Tír na nÓg is a popular Irish folk tale which tells the story of Oisín, a brave warrior and Niamh Cinn Óir, the princess of Tír na nÓg. In the traditional tale, Niamh is seen as a magical fairy-like woman who appears to Oisín from across a lake on the back of a white horse. She brings him back with her to the land of Tír na nÓg, where everyone is always happy and no one ever dies, to be her husband.
Directed by Katie O’Halloran, with choreography by Douglas Reddan and design by Brian Mitchell, Tír na nÓg premiered in the dlr Mill Theatre in June 2022.
As the 2022 recipient of the Marie Mullen Bursary, Katie was the assistant director to Sara Joyce on the world premiere of Sonya Kelly’s new play, The Last Return. She also directed a Druid Debut— The Pendulum Moon by Laura Hennessy DeSena— in the Galway International Arts Festival in July 2022.
After her bursary year, Katie assistant directed for Garry Hynes on the award-winning production of DruidO’Casey. This production included three plays by Sean O’Casey: The Plough and the Stars, The Shadow of a Gunman and Juno and the Paycock. You can read Katie’s rehearsal diaries for Week 2 and Week 5 on Druid’s website.
Developed as part of DUETS, an artist support initiative made with the combined expertise of Irish Theatre Institute, Fishamble: The New Play Company and Dublin Fringe Festival
A strange but sweet love story, this new play tells the tale of a lonely lighthouse keeper who embarks on a supernatural romance with a mysterious voice on her radio.
Is it a monster, a stranger, a ghost? Accompanied by the voices and sounds of things real and imagined, Eleanora creates a richly theatrical soundscape full of weird and wondrous fantasy.
Written by Jane Madden. Performed by Clodagh Mooney Duggan.
More about Eleanora Salter here.
“More” is featured on Eleri Ward’s new EP, Friction. Katie directed the music video for this new, original pop song in Brooklyn, NYC. Listen to “More” and the rest of Friction on all music streaming platforms.
Eleri Ward’s album, A Perfect Little Death, features new acoustic arrangements of Stephen Sondheim’s music. Katie directed the music video for “Johanna (Reprise)” at the Gene Frankel Theatre in NYC in July 2021. Listen to “Johanna (Reprise)” and the rest of A Perfect Little Death on all music streaming platforms.
In 2021, Katie directed a short reforestation documentary, focusing on the positive environmental impacts of planting native trees in Ireland. The documentary was produced by Bugs Bees & Native Trees, an organisation that hopes to activate young Irish people to address issues of the environment, biodiversity and climate change through tree planting and other national environmental projects. Actors Andrew Scott and Alex Murphy, along with a number of environmental experts, are featured in the documentary.
The X Collective is a network of 70 Irish music artists. In March 2021, Katie directed the music video for their song, “WB,” featuring Chloë Agnew, Senita, Zapho, Toshín, and Gemma Bradley.
Co-directed with artistic director Peter Brosius
Children’s Theatre Company
Mystical Menagerie, CTC's Annual Curtain Call Ball, took place on September 7, 2019. Behold a magical night of electrifying entertainment, culinary creations and fantastical fundraising. An experience unlike any other, including an all-star cabaret performance and a dazzling after party featuring the music of Dr. Mambo’s Combo!
Image of an Unknown Young Woman was directed by Katie O’Halloran for Gradfest 2020 at the Lir National Academy of Dramatic Art at Trinity College in Dublin. Set and costume design by Louise Dunne. Lighting design by Israel del Barco. Sound design by Iain Faulkner. The cast is as follows:
GIRL IN YELLOW DRESS/CANDACE: Ella Lily Hyland
LEYLA: Alison Oliver
ALI: Tiernan Messitt-Greene
YASMIN: Katherine Field
NIA: Natalie Dix
Choreographed by Niani Feelings
Written & directed by Katie O’Halloran
Pale Blue Dot Theatre Company
Roots is a dance/poetry film based on Shel Silverstein's The Giving Tree. The film is a re-telling of the story from the tree's perspective as a woman who has experienced sexual violence. Filmed in New York, New York. Starring Niani Feelings and featuring Evan Kinnane and Quinn Kennedy.
Watch Roots here.
By William Shakespeare
The Boston Conservatory
Famine in Rome is causing unrest between the common people and the patricians (the aristocrats of Rome). The people particularly resent the arrogant Caius Martius who makes no secret of the fact that he despises them. The citizens rise up against the patricians, whom they suspect of hoarding corn for themselves. They are rewarded with the creation of two people's representatives, or tribunes, who are given new powers to sit in the Senate. War with the neighbouring Volscians halts the rioting, however, and, in the battle for the town of Corioli, Caius Martius leads the Roman army with such spectacular bravery that he is honoured with the title 'Coriolanus'.
Text by William Shakespeare, Tina Packer, Sara Ahmed, and Hélèn Cixous
Devised by Katie O’Halloran and The Women of Will Project
The Robbed That Smiles fuses Shakespearean text with that of feminist theorists and scholars to create a series of performance pieces that analyze and interrogate the ways in which the "classical" theatre canon has contributed to the absence and forced silence of women in written and performative history. This production has been crafted as part of The Women of Will Project, an independent project dedicated to producing works of all-female Shakespeare with the support of Blue Water Theatre Company.
By J.M. Barrie
Blue Water Theatre Company
This is a world of possibilities, endless motion, toys, games, and fairy dust. This is a world where all things make-believe become reality— a world where magical moments are typical, but always exciting. Could reality be just as extraordinary as the world of Neverland if we allowed it to be? When and why do we stop seeing the possibilities around us, and can we learn to see them again as we once did as children? What if our bedsheets really are the sail of a pirate ship or the clouds we soar past as we take flight through the starry night sky? The mundane becomes enchanting in this production of J.M. Barrie’s classic tale.
By Ida Esmaeili
Pale Blue Dot Theatre Company
Wave (Or the Moment the Earth Shook) follows the before, during and after of three young people caught in the tsunami that devastated South East Asia and took the lives of 280,000 in 2004. It explores the violence of survivor’s guilt, loss, love and begs the question; in the face of immeasurable tragedy, how do we move on?
By Chantal Bilodeau
Pale Blue Dot Theatre Company
A mother tries to heal her relationship with her offspring:
Look at me / I wish you would look at me / simply / without guilt or shame / I may be sick / I may be oozing thick black blood / but I’m not angry / I know you / For billions of years / I have carried you in my womb / You are made of me
By William Shakespeare
Blue Water Theatre Company
Victorious Macbeth returns home from a bloody civil war and is met by three witches on the heath. Intrigued by the prophecies these supernatural beings share with him, Macbeth and his “dearest partner of greatness,” Lady Macbeth, set forth on a murderous path in order to obtain the crown. The world of this play is one of ruin, darkness, and equivocation. God is exiled and “nothing is but what is not.”
By Kendra Fanconi
Pale Blue Dot Theatre Company
Finale asks its audiences to recognize that we are one of the only species with opposable thumbs, pointing out our ability to hold things tightly while posing questions about the responsibilities that come with such a power.
By Susan Glaspell
Pale Blue Dot Theatre Company
Trifles by Susan Glaspell is a one-act play that was originally preformed in 1916. It is loosely based on a murder case Glaspell reported on when she worked as a journalist for the Des Moines Daily News, in which a man, John Hossack , was killed and the primary suspect was his wife. The plot of Trifles unfolds in much the same way, focusing on the search for clues to the murder of a local farmer Mr. Wright. The play raises questions about justice for women, and the role women can have in executing that justice.
Katie has a strong background in creating theatre for young audiences and working with student actors. She has worked as an assistant and co-director to Peter Brosius, Artistic Director of the Tony Award-winning Children’s Theatre Company in Minneapolis. She has also served as a board member and theatre director at Blue Water Theatre Company, as well as a school communications representative and director at The National Theatre for Children. She is most passionate about creating socially and environmentally conscious works for young audiences.
Katie has worked as an assistant director in Minneapolis, Boston, and Dublin. Companies and institutions for whom she has assisted include Druid, Irish National Opera, The Lir National Academy of Dramatic Art, Ten Thousand Things, Children’s Theatre Company, The Boston Conservatory, Mixed Precipitation, The Playwrights’ Center, and The Foundry. Most recently she has assisted for Garry Hynes, Annabelle Comyn, Caroline Byrne and Sara Joyce.
