Written by Marina Carr and directed by Caitríona McLaughlin, The Boy: A Two-Play Theatrical Event brings a contemporary Irish lens to the pain and beauty of Sophocles’ Theban trilogy of Oedipus Rex, Oedipus at Colonus and Antigone.

This is a major world premiere of two new plays, that can be enjoyed separately or experienced back-to-back for the full epic story on Ireland’s national stage.

Play one is called The Boy and is inspired by Oedipus Rex. We meet Oedipus and his family at the height of their powers before things begin to unravel.

Play two is called The God and His Daughter and is inspired by Oedipus at Colonus and Antigone, exploring the consequences that continue into the next generation.

Cast includes Frank Blake and Eileen Walsh, with further cast to be announced soon.

In this hotly-anticipated theatre experience, playing as part of Dublin Theatre Festival 2025, The Boy: A Two-Play Theatrical Event continues Carr’s vivid conversation with the foundations of modern drama.

Marina Carr 

Marina Carr’s plays to date are Ullalloo, 1989; Low in the Dark, 1991; The Mai, 1994; Portia Coughlan, 1996; By the Bog of Cats, 1998; On Raftery’s Hill, 1999; Ariel, 2000; Woman and Scarecrow, 2004; The Cordelia Dream, 2006; Marble, 2007; 16 Possible Glimpses, 2009; Hecuba, 2015; iGirl, 2021; Girl on an Altar, 2022-3; Audrey or Sorrow, 2024; and The Map of Argentina, 2024. Adaptations are Anna Karenina (from Tolstoy’s novel), 2016; Blood Wedding (a new version of Lorca’s play), 2019; and Virginia Woolf’s To the Lighthouse, 2021. Plays for children are Meat and Salt, 2003 and The Giant Blue Hand, 2007.

Her work has been produced by the Abbey Theatre, the Gate, Druid, Landmark, the Royal Court, Wyndham’s Theatre, the RSC, the Almeida, the Kiln, the MacCarter Theatre, San Diego Rep, and Milwaukee rep. She is translated into many languages and produced around the world.

She also wrote a new, contemporary translation of Rigoletto for Opera Theatre Company, which toured Ireland in 2015, and wrote an original oratorio Mary Gordon as part of a commission for Wicklow County Council that brought together choirs from throughout County Wicklow with solo singers and the RTÉ National Symphony Orchestra in November 2016.

Prizes include Windham-Campbell Prize 2017 for her body of work, the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, the American/Ireland Fund Award, the E.M Forster Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Macaulay Fellowship, and the Puterbaugh Fellowship. She is a member of Aosdána.   

Carr has taught at Trinity College Dublin, at Villanova, and at Princeton; and currently she is an Associate Professor at Dublin City University. Carr is published by The Gallery Press, Nick Hern Books and Faber & Faber.