THEATRE / SCOTLAND Ulster American

Education Resources 85 minutes, no interval Suitable for Year 12 Students

Compiled by Kimberley Martin, December 2018 Copyright protects this Education Resource. Except for purposes permitted by the Copyright Act, reproduction by whatever means is prohibited. However, limited photocopying for classroom use only is permitted by educational institutions. The content remains the property of the Adelaide Festival Inc. 2018.

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Arts Curriculum subjects, English and areas covered and relevant IB subjects Suggested curriculum links presented in following colours:

SACE Drama Music English

IB Arts Individuals and Societies Language and Literature

CAPABILITIES Literacy and numeracy come in many forms – non-verbal, visual and embodied, the Arts provide opportunities for students to deepen their literate and numerate experiences. Viewing and experiencing performance requires Critical and Creative Thinking, and challenges Personal & Social viewpoints, Intercultural Understanding and Ethical Understandings.

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Content Warnings

Ulster American is recommended for Year 12 students only with parental permission and school support. It contains strong language, violence, sexual references, and themes including rape and sexual assault and graphic violence.

NO LATECOMERS ADMITTED

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Content

Pg. 5 About Pg. 6 Synopsis and Themes Pg. 8 Production Pg. 10 Curriculum links & provocations and activities pre and post show Pg. 15 Meet the company plus additional resources

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About

Winner of the 2018 Best of Edinburgh Award as well as a Scotsman Fringe First, the most talked-about show of the Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2018 arrives fresh from a smash-hit, sold out run at the Traverse Theatre.

Written by Belfast born actor turned playwright David Ireland, whose most recent play Cyprus Avenue won the James Tait Black Award 2017 and Best Play at the Irish Times Theatre Awards2017, and directed by Traverse Associate Director Gareth Nicholls ( How to Disappear, Letters to Morrissey, Trainspotting ).

Exploring abuses of power, the confusion of cultural identity and the silencing of the female voice, Ulster American is confrontational and brutally funny.

Photo: Sid Scott

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Synopsis

Famed actor from America, Jay, Northern Irish playwright, Ruth, and British theatre director, Leigh, gather the night before rehearsals start for Ruth’s play. Leigh and Ruth are anticipating great success hinging on Jay’s involvement in the production and Jay is looking forward to connecting to his Irish heritage. During the course of the conversations on the play’s challenges and provocation the discussion becomes heated and very personal. Each are challenged to question their moral compasses and sets in motion a series of events that starts to expose their true personalities in quite an ugly and grotesque and ultimately leads to a violent climax.

Themes

Cultural Identity Gender Politics Abuse of Power Disempowerment of the female voice

Photo: Sid Scott

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Characters

Jay, Male, mid 40s. An Oscar-winning movie star from America Leigh, Male, mid 40s. An ambitious theatre director from England Ruth, Female, 30s. A talented playwright from Northern Ireland

Together they present idiotic, posturing, mansplainers who are blissfully unaware of the depth of their ignorance when it comes to world affairs (in this case Northern Ireland)

To quote Jay, the Oscar-winning movie star from America, When someone treats me like a piece of shit… I bring out my Academy Award. It has something to say. It’s saying I’m right.

Photo: Sid Scott

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Production

Style and Conventions

Ulster American is both outrageous and uproarious and for Drama, English and Creative Arts students it provides an experience of black satire theatre that intends to provoke conversations we need to have.

Naturalistic in script, timing and performance but performed on a thrust stage. The set design is also naturalistic; the audience views the three performers in a contemporary hotel room in which all the action takes place over the course of one evening in real time.

Venue

Dunstan Playhouse, Adelaide Festival Centre. 600 seat proscenium arch theatre with both raked stalls and balcony.

Tech Insider

Flats are an incredibly useful and commonly used component to set design. They are a way of providing scenery that is lightweight and more portable (great for touring productions!) than building real walls for interior scenes. Often flats show scenery to give audiences insight into where the action is taking place; this can be realistic or more abstract. In Ulster American flats are used to create the hotel-room where the action takes place. Here is an insight into the technical structure of these flats so that the Adelaide Festival production team can recreate the set perfectly after it has been sent all the way from the United Kingdom.

*INSERT PRODUCTION IMAGE OF SET BELOW FLATS IMAGE

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Curriculum

Provocations and activities – Pre-Show

The characters make reference to Princess Diana and Margaret Thatcher as examples of women in power and those disempowered. References that could be helpful for students to understand:

Who was Princess Diana? Princess Diana was Princess of Wales while married to Prince Charles. One of the most adored members of the British royal family, she died in a 1997 car crash. Born Diana Spencer on July 1, 1961, Princess Diana became Lady Diana Spencer after her father inherited the title of Earl Spencer in 1975. She married the heir to the British throne, Prince Charles, on July 29, 1981. They had two sons and later divorced in 1996. Diana died on August 31, 1997, from injuries she sustained in a car crash in Paris. She is remembered as the "People's Princess" because of her widespread popularity and global humanitarian efforts. Find more at: https://www.biography.com/people/princess-diana-9273782

Who was Margaret Thatcher? Prime Minister (1925–2013) The first female prime minister of Britain, Margaret Thatcher was a controversial figurehead of conservative ideology during her time in office. Born on October 13, 1925, in Grantham, England, Margaret Thatcher became Britain's Conservative Party leader and in 1979 was elected prime minister, the first woman to hold the position. During her three terms, she cut social welfare programs, reduced trade union power and privatized certain industries. Thatcher resigned in 1991 due to unpopular policy and power struggles in her party. She died on April 8, 2013, at age 87. Find out more from: https://www.biography.com/people/margaret-thatcher-9504796

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Both women were influential in vastly different ways – students to discuss what and where their spheres of influence were most influential?

Historical Context Students to research: 1. the conflicts of Northern Ireland – both religion based and the rule of the British 2. Many Irish immigrated to America – research why and the conflict that led to the Boston tea party. 3. England is said to have an entrenched class system – research the origins of this and consider its impact on society, particularly in terms of gender balance.

A class discussion forming links between the three perspectives will increase understanding of the characters’ motivations and heighten students understanding of the depth of conflict within the performance.

How can comedy be used to explore difficult topics? “A good joke packs a harder punch than many other forms of dialogue, and it can reach people who would otherwise be unwilling to listen.” - Mary O’Hara, Mosaic 30 August 2016

As the English cop-turned-comedian Alfie Moore points out , if they are laughing, they are listening, when talking about his greater impact as a comedian than when he was a policeman.

Liz Carr ’s (British actress, comedian, broadcaster and international disability rights activist) wickedly dark comedy pivots on challenging perceptions. Carr, says that to regard comedy merely as something frivolous would constitute a failure to comprehend its place in the world. With a career spanning radio, television (she currently stars in the hit drama Silent Witness ), stand-up and sketch comedy, Carr was one of the pioneers in the flourishing arena of comics with disabilities; Often we don’t know how to react about things , she says. And there’s an expectation that you shouldn’t laugh at this or at that. I’m thinking about disability [here]. People are, ‘Oh… we don’t want to offend anyone. So there’s something about, if you can break that down in laughter, it’s like a relief and a release valve. Read the whole article at: http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20160829-how-laughter-makes- us-better-people

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Power Play What can happen when those in power abuse their position? Students to discuss past and present political leaders who have extended their hold on power in this way (Hitler, Stalin, Putin, Trump) and consider any other positions in society where this might happen (i.e. Harvey Weinstein).

Cultural Identity Crisis Students to discuss their understanding and perceptions of:

- What is cultural identity and how do stereotypes play a role in this? - What is your cultural identity? - Do you think other people identify you with this same cultural identity? - Why or why not?

Post-Show Ideas and Conversation Starters

To be one-eyed From The Macquarie Dictionary: Adjective 2. having a strong bias in favour of someone or something: * Every studio had a crowd of one-eyed followers who'd vote for the studio's representative –t.a.g. hungerford, 1983. Consider the motif of being one-eyed in relation to Jay’s character. When was this idea used throughout the script? Which characters mention it and what are others’ reactions? How does this link to the climax of the play?

Psychological violence - what is it? Discover more through this link: https://www.1800respect.org.au/violence-and-abuse/psychological-abuse/ How has Ireland (playwright) applied psychological violence in Ulster American ? What physicality and vocal choices did the actors layer upon the text to enhance this? How has the designer created a ‘trap’ in-which this violence can take place where characters have no escape?

Identity Look at the characters’ identities - where are they blurred? Why are they blurred? They believe they’re one thing but other characters believe they’re something different? Students to role play a selected character AND introduce themselves without discussing profession.

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Coercion - what is it? From The Macquarie Dictionary: noun 1. the act or power of coercing; forcible constraint. Where does it appear in the production? How was it portrayed across the different parts of the production (script, acting/directing, lighting, sound, set)?

#metoo movement Students to discuss the global phenomena and impact of this movement Students to discuss gender divides such as the glass ceiling and personal and economic choices between men and women

Activity Ideas

Playwriting and scene building activity In small groups, students to establish a scenario with three characters from diverse backgrounds.

Questions to consider: Who would you put in a melting pot? Restricted to one room? What personalities/histories/characters? What pressures can you apply to them to make the dialogue ‘heat up’?

Power Play Students to explore how power can be explored without language. Have students use their physicality and spacial awareness to explore levels, proximity, gesture and stance to show power and status between characters. Challenge them to provide 10 levels of showing power along a scale of 1 - 10 from very subtle to extremely explicit. Students can show these to the rest of the class and provide feedback to each other in order to analyse the techniques they employed to create each power play. Students to consider what happened in Ulster America when power was abused and Who held power at different points of the play and how did they exploit this. As a group, students create a mind map to show how all characters held power at different times and in different ways.

Revisit the themes

• Cultural Identity • Gender Politics • Abuse of Power

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• Disempowerment of the female voice Students to discuss if having explored them prior to the production did this add/distract from the intent of the performers and the production.

Student Review

For the student’s review, points for them to consider in addition to normal review practice: • Did they have sympathy for one or more of the characters, and did that change during the course of the play? • Is it possible to put aside personal convictions when reviewing a piece of political gender focused writing? For review writing format: See Review Writing Guide document

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Meet the Company

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. Today, under Artistic Director Orla O'Loughlin, 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 spanning theatre, dance, performance, music and spoken word.

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 Harrower and Zinnie Harris - and continues to discover and support new voices, including Stef Smith, Morna Pearson, Gary McNair and Rob Drummond.

With two custom-built and versatile theatre spaces, the Traverse's home in Edinburgh's city centre holds an iconic status as the theatrical heart of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe every August

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. Further afield, the Traverse frequently tours internationally and engages in exchanges and partnerships - most recently in India, New Zealand and Quebec.

From Traverse Theatre Company website: https://www.traverse.co.uk/about-us/the-traverse/

Performers

Darrell D’Silva (Jay Conway) Recent theatre credits: Woyzeck, Hedda Gabler (Old Vic); X (Royal Court); Wendy & Peter (Royal Shakespeare Company); Dunsinane (Royal Shakespeare Company/National ); Making Stalin Laugh (JW3). 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

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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.

Robert Jack (Leigh Carver) Robert trained at Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama. 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 (); 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).

Lucianne McEvoy (Ruth Davenport) 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). 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.

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Creative Team

Kate Bonney (Lighting Designer) 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). 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 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.

David Ireland (Writer) David is from Belfast and trained as an actor at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama. 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 to 2012. 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.

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Michael John McCarthy (Composer & Sound Designer) Michael John is a Cork-born, Glasgow- based composer, musician and sound designer. 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.

Becky Minto (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). 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.

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She has been nominated for three Critics’ Awards for Theatre in Scotland and a Manchester Evening News Award for Best Design

Gareth Nicholls (Director) Gareth is Associate Director at the Traverse Theatre. His recent shows include 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).

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.

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Additional Resources

Fahrenheit 11/9 : A film by Michael Moore exploring Trump’s rise to power and the danger of letting racist, sexist, misogynist comments and behaviour go un-checked. Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZeLvaflLLc

Harold Pinter - Activist, Playwright, Screenwriter, Poet - Biography https://www.biography.com/people/harold-pinter-9441163

John Osborne - Biography - IMDb https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0651570/bio

P is for political theatre | Stage | The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2012/mar/27/p-political-theatre-modern-drama Mar 27, 2012 - "Does political theatre ever have any impact?" That, more or less, was the question that came from the floor during my session with David Hare ...

What has #MeToo actually changed? - BBC News https://www.bbc.com/news/world-44045291

How Artists Have Responded to the Me Too Movement | Art Business ... https://abj.artrepreneur.com/me-too/

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