By David Ireland Traverse Theatre Company
ULSTER AMERICAN 20–24 March • ASB Waterfront Theatre
Scenario A classic three-hander set in a serviced apartment involves Jay, a rambunctious Oscar-winning actor taking the lead in a play that connects with his Irish roots; Leigh, an English director who will do anything to get noticed; and Ruth, the Northern Irish playwright whose script is hopefully about to be turned into a West End hit.
The stage is set for great success but when the three meet to discuss the play’s challenges and provocations a line is crossed, and the heated discussion quickly escalates to a dangerous and violent climax. WINNER CAROL TAMBOR Best of Edinburgh Award SCOTSMAN Fringe First Award
Supported by Creative Scotland and City of Edinburgh Council. With support from the JMK Trust and British Council New Zealand. Assisted by the Made in Scotland Onward Touring Fund.
Credits
Artistic Notes
Cast Darrell D’Silva, Jay Conway Robert Jack, Leigh Carver Lucianne McEvoy, Ruth Davenport
David Ireland, Writer
Writer David Ireland Director Gareth Nicholls Designer Becky Minto Lighting Designer Kate Bonney Composer & Sound Designer Michael John McCarthy Fight Director EmmaClaire Brightlyn Assistant Director Kolbrún Björt Sigfúsdóttir Production Manager Kevin McCallum Chief Electrician Renny Robertson Head of Stage Gary Staerck Lighting & Sound Technicians Dave Bailey Joe Davis Company Stage Manager Gemma Turner Costume Supervisor Sophie Ferguson 1hr 25mins no interval IMAGES: MIHAELA BODLOVIC
When I first wrote Ulster American I didn’t think anyone would produce it, let alone come and see it. I was surprised and delighted that the response to it was so positive in Edinburgh. I’ve no idea why that is. The characters are outrageous and occasionally terrifying. But then we do seem to be living in outrageous and occasionally terrifying times. Like Ruth in the play, I grew up in Belfast during the Troubles. I’m well aware of the dangers of tribalism and sanctimony. And sometimes it feels like the whole world is becoming like Northern Ireland in the 80s and 90s. Ulster American offers no solutions but perhaps a respite. As it goes on tour, I hope audiences in Australia, New Zealand and elsewhere will find themselves entertained, engaged and sometimes infuriated by this unnerving burlesque of a play. Gareth Nicholls, Director For me, theatre is at its best when it’s a communal experience, where people can come together and respond to something – live and in the moment. And this certainly was the case during the first outing of Ulster American. So many people connected with it as it touched on themes such as identity and gender politics – themes that are absolutely at the forefront of peoples’ minds, both politically and socially. It provoked some strong emotions and sparked debates in the bar, online and in the papers long after people saw the show. I think theatre has a unique power to do this and it’s vital we don’t shy away from that. It will be fascinating to see if audiences in Australasia respond to the play (and its stellar cast) with the same energy and passion as they did in Scotland.
Biographies
DAVID IRELAND Writer
GARETH NICHOLLS Director
David is from Belfast and trained as an actor at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama.
Gareth is Interim Artistic Director at the Traverse Theatre.
His first play, What the Animals Say, was produced at Òran Mór, Glasgow. His other plays include Everything Between Us (Tinderbox); The End of Hope (Òran Mór); Yes So I Said Yes (Ransom); Half a Glass of Water (Field Day); Most Favoured (Traverse Theatre/Òran Mór); Can’t Forget About You (Lyric Theatre, Belfast); The Hen Night (Royal Conservatoire of Scotland); and Cyprus Avenue (Royal Court/Abbey Theatre). He was Playwright-in-Residence at Lyric Theatre, Belfast from 2011–12. Everything Between Us won the Meyer-Whitworth Award and the Stewart Parker Award in 2011. Cyprus Avenue won the Irish Times Award for Best New Play and the James Tait Black Prize for Drama in 2017, and recently ran at the Public Theater in New York. He is currently working on new plays for the Royal Court and the Abbey, and has various screen projects in development.
His recent shows include Arctic Oil, How to Disappear and Letters To Morrissey (Traverse Theatre), the Scottish premiere of Yasmina Reza’s God of Carnage (Tron Theatre) and the sell-out production of Irvine Welsh’s Trainspotting (Citizens Theatre). Other directing credits include: Blackbird by David Harrower, Into That Darkness by Gitta Sereny, Vanya by Sam Holcroft (Citizens Theatre); Under Milk Wood by Dylan Thomas (Tron Theatre); A Gambler’s Guide to Dying by Gary McNair (Show & Tell); Prom by Oliver Emanuel (Òran Mór); Educating Ronnie by Joe Douglas (Utter); The Tin Forest South West (National Theatre of Scotland); Tis Pity She’s a Whore, Coriolanus, The Burial at Thebes (Royal Conservatoire of Scotland). Gareth has won three Fringe First Awards and was previously Citizens Theatre’s Main Stage Director in Residence (2014–16).
DARRELL D’SILVA Jay Conway
ROBERT JACK Leigh Carver
LUCIANNE McEVOY Ruth Davenport
Recent theatre credits: Woyzeck, Hedda Gabler (Old Vic); X (Royal Court); Wendy & Peter (Royal Shakespeare Company); Dunsinane (Royal Shakespeare Company/ National Theatre of Scotland); Making Stalin Laugh (JW3).
Robert trained at Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama.
Theatre includes: Numbered, Sacrifice at Easter, Woyzeck (Corcadorca); Bold Girls, The Libertine (Citizens Theatre); What Put the Blood, Riders To The Sea (Abbey Theatre); Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time (National Theatre); Jumpy, The Weir, Blood and Ice (Royal Lyceum Theatre Edinburgh); Dance of Death (Vox Motus/Citizens Theatre); Leaving Planet Earth (Grid Iron/Edinburgh International Festival); A Doll’s House (National Theatre of Scotland/ Royal Lyceum Theatre Edinburgh); The Making of Us (Tramway/ National Theatre of Scotland); Festen (Birmingham Rep); The Thebans (Theatre Babel); The Boy Who Fell Into A Book (English Touring Theatre); Hinterland (Out of Joint in association with Abbey Theatre and National Theatre); Translations (Abbey Theatre) and Dolly West’s Kitchen (Old Vic/Abbey Theatre).
For the Royal Shakespeare Company: Little Eagles, King Lear, Antony and Cleopatra, Julius Caesar, The Winter’s Tale, The Drunks, Midsummer Night’s Dream, Troilus & Cressida, The Spanish Tragedy, Camino Real. For the National Theatre: The Rose Tattoo, Royal Hunt for the Sun, Tales From Vienna Woods, Closer, Further Than The Furthest Thing. Other theatre incudes: Children’s Children (Almeida Theatre); Fall (Traverse Theatre); The White Devil (Menier Chocolate Factory); Franco Zeffirelli’s production of Absolutely! (Perhaps) (Wyndhams Theatre); Antarctica (Savoy Theatre); Six Characters in Search of an Author (Young Vic); Paradise Lost (Royal & Derngate); The Lying Kind (Royal Court). TV credits include: Informer, Strike Back, Game of Thrones, Endeavour, Asylum, Father Brown, Poppy Shakespeare, Criminal Justice, Saddam’s Tribe, Krakatoa The Last Days, Spooks, Messiah, Lawless, Cambridge Spies, Queen of Swords, Out of the Blue, Prime Suspect. Film: Official Secrets, The Throwaways, Closer to the Moon, Northmen, The Viking Saga, Montana, Dirty Pretty Things, Showpieces, Song.
Theatre includes: Rhinoceros (Royal Lyceum Theatre/DOT Theatre/ Edinburgh International Festival); A Steady Rain (Theatre Jezebel); Much Ado About Nothing, The Glass Menagerie, And Then There Were None (Dundee Rep); Charlie Sonata, The Crucible, The Merchant of Venice (Royal Lyceum Theatre Edinburgh); Pressure (Royal Lyceum Theatre Edinburgh/Chichester Festival Theatre); Striptease & Out at Sea (Vanishing Point/Citizens Theatre); Black Watch, Home: Caithness (National Theatre of Scotland); White Rose (Firebrand); Stones in His Pockets (Tron Theatre); Moby Dick, Trouble and Shame, The End of Hope, The End of Desire, What The Animals Say (Òran Mór); Interiors, A Brief History of Time (Vanishing Point). Television includes: In Plain Sight (ITV); River City (BBC Scotland); Till Death Us Do Part, Hancock’s Half Hour – Lost Sitcoms (BBC); Gary: Tank Commander (Comedy Unit). Recent radio includes: Measure for Measure (BBC Radio 3); The Tragic History of My Nose; the Émile Zola series Blood, Sex & Money (BBC Radio 4).
Television includes: Outlander, NY-LON. Radio includes: The Vital Spark: Intelligence, Stardust, If I Could Fly. Film includes: In America, A Family Affair, The Pear Bottle.
BECKY MINTO Designer
KATE BONNEY Lighting Designer
MICHAEL JOHN MCCARTHY Composer & Sound Designer
Recent projects include: How to Disappear (Traverse Theatre); The Last Bordello (Fire Exit); Shift (National Theatre of Scotland); Passing Places (Dundee Rep); The Rise and Fall of Little Voice (Pitlochry Festival Theatre).
Kate trained at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and drama. She designs lighting for live performance and events, both nationally and internationally. She recently worked on Bingo! The Musical (Grid Iron/Stellar Quines); Passing Places (Dundee Rep); The 306: Day (National Theatre of Scotland); The Red Shed (Mark Thomas/ Lakin McCarthy).
Michael John is a Cork-born, Glasgowbased composer, musician and sound designer.
She has designed over 100 productions for companies including Royal Lyceum Theatre Edinburgh, Grid Iron, Visible Fictions, Vanishing Point, Scottish Dance Theatre, Lung Ha, All or Nothing, Perth Rep, 7:84, The Byre Theatre, Citizens Theatre, Upswing Aerial Theatre Company, Walk The Plank, Mark Murphy and Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. Becky was Associate Designer for the Opening and Closing Ceremonies for Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games. Her designs for the National Theatre of Scotland’s Ignition and Iron-Oxide’s White Gold were selected for the exhibition Make Believe/UK Design for Performance, at the Prague Quadrennial and the V&A in London in 2015. Her designs have been shown at the Society of British Theatre Designers exhibitions. She was awarded the Silver Medal for Space Design for the National Theatre of Scotland’s The 306: Dawn at the World Stage Design exhibition, 2017. She has been nominated for three Critics’ Awards for Theatre in Scotland and a Manchester Evening News Award for Best Design.
She has worked for various companies, such as Scottish Opera, Tron Theatre, Scottish Youth Theatre, Pitlochry Festival Theatre, Birds of Paradise and Lyric Theatre. Kate has also led the design for the award-winning Enchanted Forest in Highland Perthshire since 2013.
EMMACLAIRE BRIGHTLYN Fight Director Originally from Canada, EmmaClaire Brightlyn is a freelance actor, fight director and teacher based in Glasgow and Toronto. Fight directing credits include: Dragon (Vox Motus/National Theatre of Scotland/Tianjin Children’s Art Theatre); Oresteia: This Restless House (Citizens Theatre/National Theatre of Scotland); Cockpit (Royal Lyceum Theatre); The Maids, Miss Julie, The Libertine, Rapunzel (Citizens Theatre); The Lonesome West, The Motherf**ker With The Hat (Tron Theatre); The Seafarer, Macbeth, Knives in Hens, Richard III (Perth Theatre); Titus Andronicus, August: Osage County, Deathtrap (Dundee Rep); Hamlet (Wilderness of Tigers); Slope (Untitled Projects); The Last Bordello (Fire Exit). EmmaClaire also appeared as a featured gladiator and co-fight captain in Ben Hur Live! (New Arts Concerts, Germany) in 2011. Most recently she has been Fight Arranger on Scottish feature films Beats (Sixteen Films) and Anna and the Apocalypse (Blazing Griffin), released by MGM/Orion in December 2018.
Work for theatre includes: Jimmy’s Hall (Abbey Theatre); Pride & Prejudice, God of Carnage, The Lonesome West, Under Milk Wood (Tron Theatre); The Hour We Knew Nothing of Each Other, Glory On Earth, A Number, The Weir, Bondagers (Royal Lyceum Theatre Edinburgh); Gut, How To Disappear, Grain In The Blood (Traverse Theatre); Trainspotting, The Gorbals Vampire, Rapunzel, Into That Darkness, Fever Dream: Southside and Sports Day (Citizens Theatre); Rocket Post, In Time O’ Strife, Blabbermouth, The Tin Forest, The Day I Swapped My Dad For Two Goldfish, Truant, Dolls (National Theatre of Scotland); August: Osage County, George’s Marvellous Medicine, The Cheviot, The Stag and The Black, Black Oil, The BFG and Steel Magnolias (Dundee Rep Theatre); Futureproof (Everyman Cork); Light Boxes, Letters Home: England In A Pink Blouse, The Authorised Kate Bane (Grid Iron); Showtime from the Frontline, The Red Shed (Mark Thomas/Lakin McCarthy); Un Petit Molière, The Silent Treatment (Lung Ha); Bright Black, The Not-So-Fatal Death Of Grandpa Fredo (Vox Motus); Ceilidh (Theatre Gu Leor); J.R.R. Tolkien’s Leaf By Niggle (Puppet State Theatre); The Interference (Pepperdine Edinburgh); Heads Up (Kieran Hurley/Show & Tell); A Gambler’s Guide To Dying (Gary McNair/Show & Tell); Glory (Janice Parker Projects); The Winter’s Tale (People’s Light and Theatre Company, Philadelphia). Work for film includes Where You’re Meant To Be (Paul Fegan), Hey Ronnie Reagan, Pitching Up (Maurice O’Brien), Spores (Richard and Frances Poet). He is lead artist on Turntable, a participatory arts project in association with Red Bridge.
KOLBRÚN BJÖRT SIGFÚSDÓTTIR Assistant Director Position supported by The JMK Trust. Leverhulme Arts Scholar and recipient of the JMK regional bursary funded by the Leverhulme Trust Arts Scholarships Fund. Kolbrún Björt Sigfúsdóttir is an Icelandic-born director working in Scotland. She is an Associate Artist at Annexe Repertory Theatre and Artistic Director of the multi- award-winning Brite Theater. Directing credits include: The Maids, We Got Now (Annexe Repertory Theatre); Hamlet (an experience), (Can This Be) Home, Richard III (a one-woman show), Bitter Sweet (Brite Theater); Creepie Stool, The Bruce in Ireland (Black Dingo Productions). Assistant Director credits include: A Number (Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh); Billy (The Days of Howling) (Òran Mór/Traverse Theatre); The Lady from the Sea (Gothenburg City Theatre); Blasted (Reykjavik City Theatre). Kolbrún is a budding playwright and was one of six mentored playwrights at Playwrights’ Studio, Scotland, and was part of the Writers Toolkit (Traverse Theatre) in 2017. Her work has been part of Words Words Words (Traverse Theatre), Stage to Page, Tron 100 Festival and Winter Words. Her newest piece (Can This Be) Home won the New Territories Award at Prague Fringe 2018.
TRAVERSE THEATRE COMPANY Formed in 1963 by a group of passionate theatre enthusiasts, the Traverse Theatre was originally founded to extend the spirit of the Edinburgh festivals throughout the year. As Scotland’s foremost theatre company dedicated to new writing, the Traverse is proud to deliver its year-round mission of championing creative talent by placing powerful and contemporary theatre at the heart of cultural life – producing and programming urgent and diverse work. Through the work it presents, the Traverse aims to both entertain and stir conversation – reflecting the times and provoking crucial debate amongst audiences, inspiring them to ask questions, seek answers and challenge the status quo. The Traverse has launched the careers of some of the UK’s most celebrated writers – David Greig, David Harrower and Zinnie Harris – and continues to discover and support new voices. Outside the theatre walls, the Traverse runs an extensive engagement programme, offering audiences of all ages and backgrounds the opportunity to explore, create and develop.
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A BOLD, BEAUTIFUL, ONE OF A KIND PERFORMANCE COMBINING DANCE, THEATRE AND INTOXICATING LIVE MUSIC.
21–23 March • ASB Theatre, Aotea Centre