BUSINESS
Curtain opens on Irish Playography
19-04-2005
by Deirdre McArdle
The Irish Playography, an online, searchable catalogue of all new plays produced professionally in Ireland since 1950, is to go live next week.
The Playography is the brainchild of the Theatre Shop, which works to promote Irish theatre, plays, playwrights and theatre artists primarily through web-based information. The site features an information database of over 1,600 plays, 500 playwrights and 9,000 theatre practitioners.
For each play the site provides visitors with a synopsis, a cast list, a crew list and details of where and when the first production took place. In the case of the featured playwrights, the site provides biographical information and rights contact details for their work. In addition, the work of directors, actors, designers, stage managers and other crew members is acknowledged on the site.
"This is a unique project, not just in Ireland, but worldwide," said Loughlin Deegan, director of the Playography during its first phase and producer of theatre company Rough Magic, speaking with ElectricNews.Net. "It serves to not only define the Irish theatrical repertoire for the first time but also aims to reinvigorate the repertoire by re-introducing scarce and lost scripts and providing a way for visitors to gain access rights for all existing scripts."
Visitors to the site can easily search for plays performed in Ireland since 1950. They can search by play title, playwright, company, venue or year produced. Advanced searches allow visitors to search for plays with specific themes and subject matter, play type and cast size.
The soon-to-be-relaunched website will also include links to online booksellers where visitors can purchase copies of the plays, while many unpublished scripts will be downloadable directly from the website.
"Primary users of this site are theatre practitioners all over the world who are searching for a suitable play to produce, and theatre academics looking to research various aspects of Irish theatre" said Deegan. "Secondary users would be journalists and the general public for example."
Since the launch of the first phase of the Playography in December 2003, the Theatre Shop has received positive feedback from the Irish and global theatre sector alike. The site has also seen a steady rise in visitors. The first phase compiled plays from the present day back to 1975 with the second phase charting plays from 1975 back to 1950. A further third phase, which is set to get underway in the coming months, will gather information on plays back as far as 1904 when the Abbey Theatre came into being.
"This online database is the product of three years of detailed research so far," said Deegan. "The comprehensiveness of the project has been recognised globally and other countries are looking at the Playography as a model for projects in their own countries."
The second phase of the Playography will be officially launched on 26 April at an event at the Gate Theatre in Dublin.
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