Don’t miss the latest from award-winning playwright Marina Carr (By the Bog of Cats, On Raftery’s Hill) and award-winning director Caitríona McLaughlin (Citysong, On Raftery’s Hill). These two powerhouses of contemporary Irish theatre reunite for The Boy, a major new Abbey Theatre production receiving its World Premiere this September.
Channelling the pain and beauty of Greek myth into a radically new form for today, The Boy continues Marina Carr’s conversation with the foundations of modern drama. Marina Carr describes her play as “loosely based, on the three Theban plays” where The Boy, traumatically stolen from his family, “is where it all begins, and where it all ends.”
The Abbey Theatre’s New Work team commissioned Marina Carr to write three new plays that speak to both Greek myth, and to one another. The Abbey is producing these three masterful new pieces of work as one epic theatrical presentation – which will be experienced in two meaty sittings as one durational event, or as one of two parts.
Caitríona McLaughlin says The Boy delivers “the wildness of Marina’s imagination,” adding “she has given us a challenge with multiple locations created in this script, some are based in the real world, some are fantastical, some are extraordinary, dark, and light. She has given us a massive challenge, but that’s the fun of it.”
Collaborating over 19 weeks, The Boy combines an assembled creative team of Irish theatre’s finest artists with a cast of 20 actors. Rehearsals begin in June.