Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Tom Creed


Tom is a co-founder and joint Artistic Director of Playgroup, and Associate Director of Rough Magic Theatre Company in Dublin and the Tobacco Factory Theatre in Bristol. He studied English and Philosophy at UCC, and trained as a director on Rough Magic’s SEEDS programme and at the National Theatre Studio, London.

He directs new and contemporary writing, classic plays and devised performance work, in theatres and off site contexts.

Directing credits for Rough Magic include Solemn Mass for a Full Moon in Summer, Life is a Dream, Attempts on her Life (for which he was nominated for Best Director at the 2007 Irish Times Theatre Awards), Dream of Autumn, and 4.48 Psychosis as part of the SEEDS 2 showcase. Since joining the company in 2006, he has also curated and coordinated two cycles of the acclaimed SEEDS artist development programme.

He has directed all of Playgroup’s work to date: Say Hi To The Rivers And The Mountains (a music theatre piece by Jonathan Coe and the High Llamas for note Productions and Dublin Docklands’ Analog festival); The Heights (a show based on Wuthering Heights at Project Arts Centre, Dublin); The Art of Swimming (a show about long distance swimming in Glasgow, Edinburgh, Cork, Dublin, Kinsale, Amsterdam and the Hague, nominated for Total Theatre Award – Edinburgh Festival 2007, winner of Bewley’s Café Theatre Award – Dublin Fringe Festival 2007); The Train Show (a performance on a train with Once Off Productions for Cork Midsummer Festival); Dark Week (a large-scale promenade event at the Everyman Palace, nominated for Judges Special Award at Irish Times Theatre Awards 2005), Soap! (a live soap opera at Cork Midsummer Festival, Dublin Fringe, Everyman Palace and and radio version on Red FM, nominated for Sexiest Show at Dublin Fringe Festival 2003 and PPI Award for Best Radio Drama 2004); Crave and Integrity (Granary Theatre, Cork).

Other directing credits include: Broken Croí-Heart Briste (a bilingual play by Manchán Magan at Dublin Fringe Festival); All Over Town (Calipo/THISISPOPBABY); The Last Mile (Blue Raincoat); Ian Wilson’s The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World with Gavin Friday at Brighton Festival and Centre Culturel Irlandais, Paris; The Coming World (Making Strange); The Case of the Rose Tattoo (Dublin Theatre Festival); Mr Kolpert (Once Off Productions Rep Experiment at Dublin Fringe Festival); Love’s Labour’s Lost and Vinegar Tom (Samuel Beckett Centre); The Ideal Homes Show (Activate Youth Theatre); Purple (Dublin Youth Theatre); Older People for Beginners (Cork 2005’s Culture and Health programme); and Crystal (Meridian at the English Market, Cork).

He is a board member of the Dublin Fringe Festival and the Association of Theatre Directors Ireland, and Theatre and Dance Curator for Kilkenny Arts Festival.

He is currently developing a documentary theatre project with punk rock musicians; a music theatre piece with composer Ian Wilson inspired by the life and work of Hildegard of Bingen; and Berlin Love Tour for Playgroup, a performance presented as a guided city tour, set in Berlin but with another city standing in for Berlin. He made his debut as a DJ at the recent Dublin Fringe Festival, and would love someone to let him do it again sometime.

More info: Irish Theatre Artists Profile: http://bit.ly/tomcreed
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/tomcreed
Twitter: http://twitter.com/tomcreed1980