We’re excited to introduce our second INVEST Artist Takeover, a monthly feature where our INVEST artists share their experiences, creative journey, and insights from the programme in their own words.
This month’s INVEST Artist Takeover features award-winning playwright Karis Kelly.
What have you been working on recently?
Recently I’ve been helping to curate and creatively produce Front & Centre : Women of the North’s Playwriting Symposium – a three day event in association with Queens University, Belfast. It was born out of a desire to address gender inequality for playwrights in Northern Ireland.
Men accounted for three quarters of all credited writers in UK theatre in 2022. Maggie Cronin’s 2021 “The Headcount” research shows that the percentage of plays written by women drops to only 15% in some of our major venues here in Northern Ireland. Maggie’s research also uncovered an inverse relationship between public funding and gender equality in the production of work. That is to say, the theatres receiving the most public funding produced the lowest number of plays by women. Plays are written to be performed. The only way a playwright really learns is in communion with an audience. When we rob female playwrights of that opportunity, we’re robbing them of their chance to learn and develop. When women artists do not get to develop their craft, an entire generation of Northern Irish voices and writers is lost. Further, audiences are denied the opportunity to see a diversity of voice and story on our local stages. Northern Irish women deserve to see authentic representations of themselves. They deserve to have their stories told by people with lived experience. These plays and their writers need support from venues and companies, and need platforms to have their voices heard. Front and Centre ask – why isn’t this happening? And what can we do to change it? Front & Centre will bring together theatre enthusiasts, artists, academics, researchers and policy-makers for three enlivening days, including readings, performances, screenings, panels, discussions and scratches. It runs from May 23rd – May 25th. You can book here.
I’ve also been writing. I’m currently working on a first draft of a new play called Broken Irish – which has meant learning Irish, which my INVEST bursary has helped towards. I’m nervous, as I’ll be taking my CĂşpla Focal exam with Turas in East Belfast soon, and I’m not sure I’m ready!
Any upcoming projects, performances, or exhibitions?
I have a really exciting project coming up! In 2022, my play Consumed, set in Bangor, won the Women’s Prize for Playwriting. It’s about four generations of Northern Irish women, reunited under one roof, a 90th birthday party that no-one seems to want – and a house full of hungry ghosts, with more than one skeleton in the closet … It’s been called a “pitch black comedy” – which I love, because it’s dark, delicious and a lot of fun.
It will be produced this summer by Paines Plough at the Traverse during the Edinburgh Festival and is going on tour across the UK afterwards (Leeds, Sheffield, Coventry, Guildford). No Northern Irish date as yet (which speaks to the importance of Front & Centre) but I do hope it’ll get here soon. I’ve just been in London for the auditions (with a full, Northern Irish / Irish cast, of course!) and I was blown away by the talent! I really can’t wait to share it with audiences.
Do you have any insights or takeaways from your mentorship?
My mentors have been amazing. One of the key reasons I wanted to undertake INVEST was to better understand how to strategise around my career. I couldn’t have asked for a better mentor in the brilliant Pamela McQueen. This summer feels like a crucial moment in my career. I’ve been writing for 17 years, but Consumed is my first ever professional production after years of self producing. So having Pamela’s guidance about how to approach the next few months, and my career going forward has been incredibly helpful. For example, after writing Consumed, I won the Film 4 and Peggy Ramsay Foundation bursary to write a new play. I wrote a huge, sprawling, epic, massive cast, metal musical. Which was great fun to do – but realistically, in terms of what’s going to get programmed, is very unlikely to be my next play produced after Consumed goes on tour – which is a four hander, kitchen sink drama. Pamela and I better refined what my next offering is, in terms of what I take to venues. We also talked about how to sell myself as an artist to venues, giving me very clear guidance on how to approach venues and who to approach. I’m now drawing up a three year plan about how to capitalise on this “moment” in my career and my time at Edinburgh with much more strategy in mind.
You can watch Karis’s ‘Meet the Writer’ interview with Paines Plough here: