Seamus Finnegan
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SEAMUS FINNEGAN (born 1 March 1949) is a Northern Irish playwright. He lives in London.
Early Years
Seamus Finnegan was born in Belfast, Northern Ireland, son of Billy Finnegan, a bricklayer and his wife Mary (née Magee). He was educated by the Irish Christian Brothers at St Mary’s Grammar School, Belfast. At the outbreak of ‘the Troubles’ in Northern Ireland,[1] he was a member of the Northern Civil Rights Movement and the People's Democracy (a left wing student group led by amongst others, Bernadette McAliskey née Devlin). In 1971 he went to Manchester to read English, Drama and Education. After qualifying as a teacher, he moved to London where he taught at the Jewish Free School from 1974-78.
Career
Finnegan’s first major play ACT OF UNION was produced in 1980 at the Soho Poly Theatre[2] with the support of the legendary Bill Ash and of which Irving Wardle wrote in The Times: ‘It may seem a negative compliment to this extremely informative and well-written piece, but its main achievements are to have developed a highly theatrical pattern from dislocated fragments, and to have exposed some of the tangled loyalties and hatreds of the divided country without the smallest trace of sectarian bias’. SOLDIERS, NORTH and MARY'S MEN soon followed in the quartet of ‘Troubles’ plays. In 1982, at the invitation of Kariel Gardosh, the Israeli Cultural Attaché, Finnegan’s play JAMES JOYCE AND THE ISRAELITES was performed at the First International Festival of Jewish Theatre in Tel Aviv. ‘An evening of undivided enjoyment……a non- Jewish play on a Jewish subject done with much understanding and sympathy’ (Jerusalem Post). In 1984, TOUT, a play about informers in Northern Ireland was commissioned by the Royal Shakespeare Company and performed at the Barbican as part of the THOUGHT CRIMES AT THE BARBICAN season in memory of George Orwell and his ‘1984’.
1986 saw the production of THE WAR TRILOGY which included THE SPANISH PLAY, THE GERMAN CONNECTION and subsequently for BBC Radio 3 THE CEMETERY OF EUROPE. Of THE GERMAN CONNECTION which opened at the Young Vic, Andrew Rissik wrote in The Independent: ‘Seamus Finnegan’s The German Connection is an outstanding new play whose theme is tellingly summarised in the line, ‘Betrayal can make monsters of people………….Finnegan’s writing cuts through the potential melodrama with heart-breaking perception and skill….his dialogue has an urgent workaday vigour…….’
In the mid-nineties, Finnegan was writer in residence at Mishkenot Shananim in Jerusalem, where he collaborated with Israeli dramatist, Miriam Kainy, on HYPATIA and began work on his book about Israeli playwrights, DIALOGUES IN EXILE with the help and support of Dani Horovitz, another Israeli dramatist.
Since 1998, Finnegan has worked closely with Scottish theatre director and artist, KEN McCLYMONT on more than seven productions, most notably, DEAD FACES LAUGH, DISAPORA JIGS, MURDER IN BRIDGPORT and SPINOZA and with MADANI YOUNIS at the Bush Theatre in 2012 on THE STAR IN THE CROSS, a play set in the Budapest ghetto and Jerusalem in 1944.
Finnegan’s latest work is LAMENT FOR THE SIX COUNTIES, scheduled for production in 2016 to coincide with the anniversary of the Easter Rising of 1916.
List of Plays
Laws of God, Half Moon Theatre, 1978
Act of Union, Soho Poly, 1980[3]
Herself Alone, Old Red Lion, 1981
Soldiers, Old Red Lion, 1981[4]
James Joyce and the Israelites, Lyric Studio and First International Festival of Jewish Theatre, 1982[5]
Tout, Royal Shakespeare Company, Barbican, 1984
North, Cockpit Theatre, 1984[6]
Beyond a Joke, Cockpit Theatre and Queen Elizabeth Hall, 1984
Marys Men, Drill Hall Theatre, 1984[7]
Gombeen, Air Gallery, 1985
The Spanish Play, Place Theatre, 1986[8]
The German Connection, Young Vic, 1986[9]
The Murphy Girls, Drill Hall Theatre, 1988
1916, Institute of Contemporary Art, 1989
Mary Maginn, Drill Hall Theatre, 1990[10]
Comrade Brennan, 7/84 Scotland, 1991[11]
It’s All Blarney, 1992[12]
Hypatia, National Theatre Studio, 1994
Dead Faces Laugh, Old Red Lion, 1998
Life after Life, Old Red Lion, 2000
Diaspora Jigs, Old Red Lion, 2001
Murder in Bridgport, Old Red Lion, 2002[13]
Waiting for the Angels, Old Red Lion, 2002
Landscapes after Exile, Lyric Studio, 2006
The Beautiful Nun, RADA, 2008
Fear, Misery and Laughter, Old Red Lion, 2010
Spinoza, Old Red Lion, 2010
The Star in the Cross, Bush Theatre, 2012
Lament for the Six Counties, 2015, scheduled for production 2016
Radio, TV and Film
Doctors' Dilemmas, BBC2, 1983
The Cemetery of Europe, BBC Radio 3, 1988
Wild Grass, BBC Radio 4, 1990
Shadows of Time, screenplay version of The German Connection, 1990
Run like the Wind, film script commission, 1994
Books
North, Marion Boyars, 1987[14]
The Cemetery of Europe, Marion Boyars, 1991[15]
James Joyce and the Israelites/Dialogues in Exile, Harwood Academic, 1995[16]
It’s All Blarney, Harwood Academic, 1995[17]
Dead Faces Laugh, Harwood Academic, 1999[18]
References
- ^ "Seamus Finnegan". Playography Ireland. Retrieved 27 April 2015.
- ^ Chambers, Colin; Prior, Mike (1987). Playwrights' progress : patterns of postwar British drama. Oxford: Amber Lane Press. ISBN 0906399815.
- ^ "Act of Union". Playography Ireland. Retrieved 25 April 2015.
- ^ Finnegan, Seamus (1987). North ; also, Soldiers ; Act of union ; Mary's men : four plays (Original pbk. ed. ed.). London: M. Boyars. ISBN 978-0714528700.
{{cite book}}:|edition=has extra text (help) - ^ Finnegan, Seamus (1995). James Joyce and the Israelites ; and, Dialogues in exile. Chur, Switzerland: Harwood Academic Publishers. ISBN 978-3718655496.
- ^ Finnegan, Seamus (1987). North ; also, Soldiers ; Act of union ; Mary's men : four plays (Original pbk. ed. ed.). London: M. Boyars. ISBN 978-0714528700.
{{cite book}}:|edition=has extra text (help) - ^ Finnegan, Seamus (1987). North ; also, Soldiers ; Act of union ; Mary's men : four plays (Original pbk. ed. ed.). London: M. Boyars. ISBN 0714528706.
{{cite book}}:|edition=has extra text (help) - ^ "The Spanish Play". Playography Ireland. Retrieved 27 April 2015.
- ^ Finnegan, Seamus (1991). The cemetery of Europe : the Spanish play, the German connection, the Murphy girls : three plays (Original pbk. ed. ed.). London: M. Boyars. ISBN 978-0714528953.
{{cite book}}:|edition=has extra text (help) - ^ Finnegan, Seamus (1995). It's all blarney : four plays. Chur, Switzerland: Harwood Academic Publishers. ISBN 978-3718655557.
- ^ Finnegan, Seamus (1995). It's all blarney : four plays. Chur, Switzerland: Harwood Academic Publishers. ISBN 978-3718655557.
- ^ Finnegan, Seamus (1995). It's all blarney : four plays. Chur, Switzerland: Harwood Academic Publishers. ISBN 978-3718655557.
- ^ "Seamus Finnegan". Doollee. Retrieved 27 April 2015.
- ^ Finnegan, Seamus (1987). North ; also, Soldiers ; Act of union ; Mary's men : four plays (Original pbk. ed. ed.). London: M. Boyars. ISBN 0714528706.
{{cite book}}:|edition=has extra text (help) - ^ Finnegan, Seamus (1991). The cemetery of Europe : the Spanish play, the German connection, the Murphy girls : three plays (Original pbk. ed. ed.). London: M. Boyars. ISBN 978-0714528953.
{{cite book}}:|edition=has extra text (help) - ^ Finnegan, Seamus (1995). James Joyce and the Israelites ; and, Dialogues in exile. Chur, Switzerland: Harwood Academic Publishers. ISBN 978-3718655496.
- ^ Finnegan, Seamus (1995). It's all blarney : four plays. Chur, Switzerland: Harwood Academic Publishers. ISBN 3718655551.
- ^ Finnegan, Seamus (1 Jul 2001). Dead Faces Laugh (Contemporary Theatre Review). Harwood Academic (Performing Arts). ISBN 9057551438.
Sources
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