Kaite O'Reilly – författare

Atypical Plays For Atypical Actors is the first of its kind: a collection of dramas which redefines the notion of normalcy and extends the range of what it is to be human. From monologues, to performance texts, to realist plays, these involving and subversive pieces explore disability as a portal to new experience.Includes the plays: peeling; The Almond and the Seahorse; In Water I’m Weightless; the 9 Fridas; and Cosy.Although disabled characters appear often in plays within the Western theatrical tradition, seldom have the writers been disabled or Deaf themselves, or written from those atypical embodied experiences. This is what contributes to making Kaite O’Reilly’s Selected Plays essential reading – critically acclaimed plays and performance texts written in a range of styles over twelve years, but all informed by a political and cultural disability perspective. They ‘answer back’ to the moral and medical models of disability and attempt to subvert or critique assumptions and negative representations of disabled people.The selected plays and performance texts exhibit a broad approach to issues around disability. Some, like In Water I’m Weightless/The ‘d’ Monologues (part of the Cultural Olympiad and official festival celebrating the 2012 London Olympics and Paralympics) are embedded in disability politics, aesthetics, and ‘crip’ humour. A montage of monologues that can be performed solo or as a chorus, they challenge the normative gaze and celebrate all the possibilities of human variety. The Almond and the Seahorse is different, a ‘mainstream’ character-led realist drama about survivors of Traumatic Brain Injury, with subversive politics in its belly. A response to ‘tragic but brave’ depictions of head injury and memory loss, and informed by personal experience, the play interrogates the reality of living with TBI, questioning who the ‘victims’ are.peeling, a landmark play written for one Deaf and two disabled female actors, was originally produced by Graeae Theatre Company in 2002, 2003, and for BBC Radio 3. A ‘feminist masterpiece…quietly ground breaking’ (Joyce McMillan, The Scotsman), it has become a set text for Theatre and Drama and Disability Studies university degree courses in the UK and US. Frequently remounted, its lively meta-theatrical form supports its central themes of war, eugenics, and a woman’s control over her fertility, which are as relevant today as ever. peeling was written exclusively for performers identifying as Deaf, disabled or neuro-divergent. The performance text the 9 Fridas is a complex mosaic offering multiple representations of arguably the world’s most famous female artist, Frida Kahlo, reclaiming her as a disability icon. Performed in Mandarin translation, it was the closing production of the 2014 Taipei Art Festival and will transfer to Hong Kong in October 2016. It is currently being translated into German, Hindi, and Spanish. Cosy is a darkly comedic look at the joys and humiliations of getting older and how we shuffle off this mortal coil. Three generations of a dysfunctional family explore their choices in a world obsessed with eternal youth, and asks whose life (or death) is it, anyway? An Unlimited Commission, Cosy premiered in 2016, appearing at the Unlimited Festivals at Southbank Centre and Tramway.The 9 Fridas; Cosy; and The Almond and The Seahorse: These performance texts and plays were written for an inclusive, diverse cast of disabled, non-disabled, hearing and Deaf identifying performers.

These performance texts were written exclusively for performers identifying as Deaf, disabled or neuro-divergent. This unique collection of fictional dramatic monologues was written specifically for D/deaf and disabled performers (the ‘d’ of the title), informed by lived experience. But the ‘d’ could just as easily refer to difference, diversity, defiance, determination, desirability and a host of other delicious ‘d’s…. Covering a wide variety of form, content, and theatrical styles, the monologues offer fresh perspectives on difference and disability from across the UK and beyond. From biting satire to crip’ pride, observational comedy to poignant revelations of life in contemporary Britain and beyond, these texts challenge and subvert ingrained preconceptions of disability and celebrate all the possibilities of human variety.This collection is the culmination of ten years work, with fictional monologues inspired by over 100 interviews, conversations and interactions with D/deaf and disabled individuals internationally. It brings together new and previously unperformed texts alongside monologues from In Water I’m Weightless (National Theatre Wales Cultural Olympiad 2012), the 70 minute stand alone one-woman show richard iii redux, co-written with Phillip Zarrilli, and the multilingual intercultural And Suddenly I Disappear: The Singapore/UK ‘d’ Monologues. The monologues offer a great resource for atypical performers as audition pieces and for companies and individuals as script-in-hand, full productions, solo shows or with larger casts. The variety of monologues enables flexible presentation as solo, choral or ensemble performances.

Based on the playwright's experiences during the war in the former Yugoslavia.

What happens when you want a different life to the one chosen for you? A story of desire, duty, deceit and revenge.An innovative re-telling of an ancient Welsh myth - Blodeuwedd from The Mabinogi - where nothing is quite as it seems. Rose cannot remember what came before the house at the edge of the isolated forest. Gwynne says he magicked her out of the flowers, but she's not so sure. She has played the part of the perfect farmer's wife for Lewis, who is kept firmly in place by his uncle Gwynne, and accepted her lonely existence. Then a stranger is seen in the forest. What lengths will she go to, to escape the life chosen for her?Using a cross-art form approach, this beautiful piece of storytelling will feature live music, dance, video, theatricalised sign and surtitles.