The New Electric Ballroom - 2009

ENDA WALSHWriter and DirectorEnda Walsh is one of the mostwidely performed writersin Irish theatre today. Bornin Dublin in 1967, he is aleading member of the young‘Celtic Tiger’ generation ofplaywrights, a group thatincludes Martin McDonagh andConor McPherson. His earliestinteraction with theatre wasthrough novelist Roddy Doyle,who taught him at GreendaleCommunity School in NorthDublin, wrote all the school playsand inspired the idea that theatre could be a laugh. In the early 1990s Endamoved to Cork and worked with Corcadorca Theatre Company, who producedThe Ginger Ale Boy, his second play and the first to draw interest in him asa writer. His reputation grew enormously with the national and internationalsuccess of Disco Pigs, which opened at Triskel Arts Centre in Cork in 1996.The play won the Stewart Parker Award and George Devine Award, has beentranslated and staged in 16 countries and was adapted to screen as a coproductionbetween Temple Films and Renaissance in 2001. Disco Pigstypifies a common theme in Enda Walsh’s plays, namely characters striving toarticulate or verbally communicate. In this case, Pig and Runt make up theirown language, a combination of animal noises, baby talk and Cork slang.Enda Walsh plays are commonly noted for a sense of claustrophobia and oftenexamine individuals using language to cope with disappointment or trauma.His Edinburgh Fringe First Award-winning The Walworth Farce sees a fatherforcing his sons to tell and retell the story of their exodus from Ireland – setin a small London flat. Similarly The New Electric Ballroom – also a FringeFirst Award-winner – revolves around two housebound sisters obsessed withreliving and retelling the story of one fateful night. Even earlier, The GingerAle Boy uses the metaphor of the ventriloquist. Enda Walsh is a prolific writer,working in theatre, radio and more often recently in cinema. 2008 saw therelease of Hunger, a film that chronicles the 66-day hunger strike of IRA footsoldierBobby Sands. Hunger won the Camera D’Or and international prize inCannes 2008, has garnered a number of awards at international film festivalsand has been nominated in the Outstanding British Film category of the 2009Orange British Academy Film Awards (BAFTAs). Future projects include anadaptation of his play Chatroom. Enda Walsh lives in London with his wife andtheir daughter.Druid: The Walworth Farce and The New Electric Ballroom.Other theatre: The Walworth Farce (Galway, Cork, Dublin, Edinburgh – 2007Fringe First Winner – New York, Edinburgh); Chatroom (Cottesloe, RoyalNational Theatre, March 2006, Autumn 2007); The Small Things (for PainesPlough, Menier Chocolate Factory, London and Galway Arts Festival 2005);The New Electric Ballroom (Kammerspeil Theatre Munich, winner of TheaterHeute’s Best Foreign Play 2005); two short plays, How These Men Talk (ZurichShauspielehaus) and Lynndie’s Gotta Gun for Artistas Unidos (Lisbon’sNational Theatre); Bedbound (Dublin Theatre Festival 2000, Edinburgh2001 – Fringe First Winner – Royal Court, London, New York and worldwide);Misterman (Granary Theatre); Disco Pigs (Cork, Dublin 1996; Edinburgh 1997;West End 1998 – awarded Arts Council Playwrights Award 1996, Best FringeProduction 1996, Stewart Parker and George Devine Awards 1997); TheGinger Ale Boy (Corcadorca). Also an adaptation of Dostoevsky’s The BrothersKaramazov for Theatre O, Delirium (Abbey Theatre and Barbican). Film: DiscoPigs (Temple Films / Renaissance). Hunger, (Blast / FILMFOUR), winner ofthe Camera D’Or and international prize in Cannes 2008. In development:Chatroom (for Ruby Films / FILMFOUR and Scott Rudin Films); Island of theAunts (an adaptation of Eva Ibbotson’s children’s novel for Cuba Pictures);Kinderboy (BBC).Radio: Four Big Days in the Life of Dessie Banks (RTÉ Radio – winner of the PPIAward for Best Radio Drama 2001); The Monotonous Life of Little Miss P (BBC– commended in the Berlin Prix Europa 2003).CAST BIOGRAPHIESROSALEEN LINEHAN – BredaDruid: The New Electric Ballroom (Galway,Edinburgh Festival Fringe). Other Theatre:Long Day’s Journey into Night, Gates of Gold,London Assurance, The Rivals, Happy Days,Mary Makebelieve, The Double Dealer, TwelfthNight, Heartbreak House (Gate Theatre); HappyDays (Almeida Theatre, Lincoln Centre New York,Barbican); The House of Bernarda Alba, TheImportance of Being Earnest, Mary Makebelieve,Philadelphia Here I Come, Carthaginians (Abbey Theatre); Mother of AllThe Behans (Abbey, Brighton, Edinburgh, Montreal, New York); Dancing atLughnasa (National Theatre, London, The West End, Broadway); The Ploughand the Stars, Blithe Spirit, Lost in Yonkers (Guthrie Theatre, Minneapolis);Tartuffe (Roundabout Theatre, New York); The Cripple of Inishmaan (GeffenTheatre, Los Angeles); Blood Wedding (Almeida Theatre); Bailegangaire(Royal Court, London); Des and Rosie Revues (Gaiety Theatre and on tour)As a Composer: Mary Makebelieve (Abbey & Gate); Streets of Dublin (Tivoli);Speak of the Devil (with Jim Doherty); Please Don’t Make Me Feel So Happy(with Conor Linehan); Twelfth Night (Gate), and many musical revues. Film &Television: About Adam; Happy Days (Beckett on Film); The Matchmaker; TheHi-Lo Country; Mad About Mambo; Sharpe’s Gold; Scarlett; The Butcher Boy.RUTH MC CABE – ClaraDruid: The New Electric Ballroom is Ruth's debutwith Druid. Other Theatre: The Life of Galileo(Rough Magic); Five Kinds of Silence (Calypso); TheHouse of Bernarda Alba, Prayers of Sherkin, Kingof the Castle, The Lower Depths (Abbey Theatre);The Memory of Water, Silverlands, Diary of aHunger Striker (Peacock Theatre); The Cavalcaders(The Lyric); When the Wall Came Down (Dublin,Berlin); The Man from Clare, Translations (GaietyTheatre); Bailegangaire (Royal Court); The Gigli Concert (Almeida Theatre); OurCountry’s Good (Gate Theatre); Uncle Silas, Worm in the Heart (Project). Film& Television: The Wake Wood; The Tiger’s Tail; Breakfast on Pluto; Inside I’mDancing; Intermission; Everlasting Piece; The Widow’s Son; Wild About Harry;The Closer You Get; Talk of Angels; An Awfully Big Adventure; Circle of Friends;The Snapper; The Field; The Miracle; Fatal Inheritance; My Left Foot.5