Post-show Talks
The Gate is delighted to present two upcoming post-show talks as part of its Love and Courage Season. These discussions will take place directly after the performance of the play, and are included as part of the ticket for that performance.
Post-show talk on Storytelling and Climate Change
Following the performance of The Children on March 20th, there will be a post-show discussion with Oonagh Murphy, Director of The Children, and Mrs Mary Robinson on the topic of using storytelling to communicate issues around Climate Change.
Speakers:
Mary Robinson
Mary Robinson is President of the Mary Robinson Foundation-Climate Justice. She served as President of Ireland from 1990-1997 and UN High Commissioner for Human Rights from 1997-2002. She is Chair of The Elders and a member of the Club of Madrid and the recipient of numerous honours and awards including the Presidential Medal of Freedom from the President of the United States Barack Obama. She sits on the advisory board of Sustainable Energy For All (SE4All) and is also a member of the Lead Group of the Scaling Up Nutrition (SUN) Movement. Between 2013 and 2016 Mary served as the UN Secretary General’s Special Envoy in three roles; first for the Great Lakes region of Africa, then on Climate Change and most recently as his Special Envoy on El Niño and Climate.
A former President of the International Commission of Jurists and former chair of the Council of Women World Leaders she was President and founder of Realizing Rights: The Ethical Globalization Initiative from 2002-2010 and served as Honorary President of Oxfam International from 2002-2012.
Mary Robinson serves as Patron of the Board of the Institute of Human Rights and Business, is an Ambassador for The B Team, in addition to being a board member of several organisations including the Mo Ibrahim Foundation and the European Climate Foundation. She serves as Chancellor of the University of Dublin since 1998. Mary’s memoir, ‘Everybody Matters’ was published in September 2012 and her book, ‘Climate Justice – Hope, Resilience and the Fight for a Sustainable Future’ was published in September 2018.
Oonagh Murphy
Oonagh Murphy is the Director of The Children. She previously directed Tribes by Nina Raine, at the Gate Theatre, as part of the Dublin Theatre Festival.
Other theatre credits include: Dripfeed (Fishamble/Soho Theatre), Shelter (Druid) Mouth of a Shark (WHERE WE LIVE, THISISPOPBAB), Mojo (The Lir Academy) Foxy (Project Arts Centre) Be Infants In Evil (Druid), Ribbons and Love in a Glass Jar (Abbey Theatre) Oonagh was Resident Assistant Director at the Donmar Warehouse in 2013 and at the Abbey Theatre Dublin, 2011-2012.
Prof. Frank Convery
Frank Convery is Director of the Environmental Systems Institute at University College Dublin (UCD). Prior to taking up his post at UCD, he was Assistant and then Associate Professor of Natural Resource Economics at Duke University, USA.
Frank Convery was educated at University College Dublin (UCD) and the State University of New York and has degrees in forestry and resource economics.
Prior to taking up his post at UCD, he was Assistant and then Associate Professor of Natural Resource Economics at Duke University, USA and Research Professor at the Economic and Social Research Institute, Ireland.
He was formerly Chair of the Sustainable Development Council, Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland and An Taisce. He is active on a number of EU-wide investigations and bodies as well as President of the European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists.
He has written extensively on resource and environmental economics issues with particular reference to agriculture, forestry, energy, minerals, land use, urbanisation, environment and development in developing countries.
At present, his research relates to European Union Environmental Policy with particular reference to the use, potential and effectiveness of market-based instruments.
Aoibhéann McCann
Aoibhéann McCann is an actor and advocate for sustainable fashion. Her work at the Gate Theatre includes both runs of The Great Gatsby and
ASSASSINS. Her other theatre work includes A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (Rough Magic); Coast, Harder Faster More, Wrapped (Red Bear Productions); Stars in the Morning Sky (Belgrade Theatre, Coventry); Ourselves Alone (JuSt Theatre, Camden); Much Ado About Nothing, Taming of the Shrew (Fortune’s Fool/ Iveagh Gardens); Holes (Company of Angels); The Folk Contraption, (Vault Festival, Old Vic); Suddenly Last Summer, (Hampstead Theatre/ Oxford School of Drama); Twelfth Night, Phaedra’s Love (Oxford School of Drama).
Her film and television work includes Vikings: Season 6 (MGM, History); Can’t Cope Won’t Cope 2, A Terrible Beauty (RTÉ); The Midnight Court, Cumann na mBan 100 (TG4); Soulsmith (Whim Productions); The Break, Gustav, (Stanley’s
Deathpark
Productions); Street Spirit (Bailey Films).
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Post-show talk with Marc Atkinson and David Eldridge
Following the performance of Beginning on March 28th, David Eldridge, writer of Beginning, and Marc Atkinson, Director, will give audiences an insight into the writing of the play, and how the Gate translated it from script to stage. The discussion will be moderated by Dr. Melissa Sihra, Head of Drama at Trinity College Dublin.
Speakers:
David Eldridge
Theatre credits include: Beginning (Dorfman Theatre, National Theatre & West End); Market Boy (Olivier Theatre, National Theatre); Holy Warriors (Shakespeare’s Globe); Miss Julie, The Lady from the Sea (Royal Exchange, Manchester); In Basildon, Incomplete and Random Acts of Kindness, Under the Blue Sky (Royal Court & West End); Something, Someone, Somewhere (Sixty-Six Books/Bush Theatre); MAD, Serving it Up (Bush); The Knot of the Heart (Almeida), Festen (Almeida, Lyric West End & Broadway); The Stock Da’wa, Falling (Hampstead); A Thousand Stars Explode in the Sky (with Robert Holman & Simon Stephens, Lyric Hammersmith); Babylone (Belgrade Coventry); John Gabriel Borkman, The Wild Duck, Summer Begins (Donmar Warehouse); A Week With Tony, Fighting for Breath (Finborough); Thanks Mum (Red Room); Dirty (Theatre Royal Stratford East); Cabbage for, Tea, Tea, Tea! (Platform 4 Exeter).
Under the Blue Sky won the Time Out Live Award 2001 for Best New Play in the West End and Festen the 2005 Theatregoers Choice Award for Best New Play. The Picture Man won the Prix Europa Best European Radio Drama 2008. Under the Blue Sky won the 2009 Theatregoers Choice Award for Best New Play. The Knot of the Heart won the 2012 Off West End Theatre Award for Best New Play.
In 2007 the University of Exeter conferred on David an Honorary Doctorate of Letters recognising his achievement as a playwright. He is a Lecturer in Creative Writing at Birkbeck College, University of London.
Marc Atkinson
Marc is a Brooklyn and Dublin-based director, originally from Ireland, the UK and Catalonia. Recently, Marc directed the tour of Outlying Islands by David Greig (Connelly Theater, New York City & Samuel Beckett Theatre, Dublin), Last Night in Inwood by Alix Sobler (Signature Theater Centre, New York), Zelda and Scott by Bethie Fowler (Atlantic Theater Studio, New York), Anne Washburn’s 10 Out Of 12 & Chuck Mee’s Big Love (Samuel Beckett Theatre, Dublin) and a new adaptation of Antigone created for and with Limerick Youth Theatre for their 20th Anniversary Production. Marc co-founded the company Sugarglass whose work has been presented internationally, including the Irish Premiere of Tender Napalm by Philip Ridley (Project Arts Centre, Dublin), All Hell Lay Beneath (Dublin Fringe Festival/Irish Times Cultural Highlight of 2012), Five Minutes Later by Ellen Flynn (The Lir Academy) and Ethica: Four Shorts by Samuel Beckett which was presented in the Residence of the Irish President to celebrate International Human Rights Day (Krastyo Theatre Bulgaria/ Happy Days Festival Enniskillen/Áras an Uachtaráin).
Marc was awarded the Jennifer Johnston Directing Bursary and, as Shubert Presidential Scholar, was fully funded to study for his MFA in directing under the mentorship of Anne Bogart at Columbia University, from where he graduated in 2016.
Moderator:
Dr. Melissa Sihra
Dr. Melissa Sihra is Head of Drama at Trinity College Dublin and Assistant Professor of Drama. Her new book Marina Carr: Pastures of the Unknown is published by Palgrave Macmillan. She was President of the Irish Society for Theatre Research and is Chair of this year’s Lady Gregory Autumn Gathering at Coole Park.