What We Do
The Literary Department has up to 25 playwrights under commission at any given time. Plays commissioned by the Abbey Theatre which have recently appeared on the Abbey and Peacock stages include The Passing and The East Pier by Paul Mercier, Romance by Nancy Harris, Perve by Stacey Gregg, The Last Days of a Reluctant Tyrant by Tom Murphy, Tales of Ballycumber by Sebastian Barry, Marble by Marina Carr, Kicking a Dead Horse and Ages of the Moon by Sam Shepard, Lay Me Down Softly by Billy Roche and Only an Apple by Tom Mac Intyre.
Alongside its commissioning work the Literary Department encourages new writing through ongoing development initiatives including regular in-house play readings, workshops and script discussions. We present public readings of new plays and of plays from the Abbey repertoire independently and also in conjunction with other organisations. We run the New Playwrights Programme, an intensive artist development programme which takes place over the course of eighteen months. We manage the publication of the Abbey Theatre Playscript Series, in association with various publishing houses. In order to keep in touch with emerging talent, we consider and respond to up to 350 unsolicited scripts every year. These scripts are read by the Literary Department’s readers and each writer is responded to individually.
For more information please contact Ruth McGowan, Literary Assistant or call +353 (0)1 887 2200 or by email to ruth.mcgowan@abbeytheatre.ie