A Slow Fire review: In Simon Stephens’s astonishing new play, hope is a bleak experiment
The intimate Glass Mask Theatre almost shakes under the ambition of this epic thriller directed by Rex Ryan
Simon Stephens
Playwright
2026 on stage: 20 headline plays in the year ahead, including Jodie Comer in Prima Facie
From a portrait of a declining Judy Gardland to comedy, film adaptations and musicals, there’s much to look forward to in the coming year
T5 and Sea Wall double bill review: Two very different responses to trauma pack an emotional punch
Galway International Arts Festival 2025: Simon Stephens’ short one-act monologues are strong, forthright and beautiful
Andrew Scott: ‘It’s a potentially scary thing to think that you might live up to your potential’
Scott is starring solo in New York in a production of Chekhov’s melancholy comedy Uncle Vanya, with the action relocated to rural Ireland
Playwright Simon Stephens: ‘Our sense of self is defined by the stories we tell ourselves. My family told themselves we were Irish’
The Tony and Olivier winner feels a huge affinity with Rex Ryan’s ‘fearless’ Dublin company Glass Mask, which is premiering his play Men’s Business
Men’s Business review: Avant-garde date night pregnant with commitment issues
Theatre: Rex Ryan and Lauren Farrell star in Glass Mask’s world premiere of Simon Stephens’s new play
‘It was a novel that was read by everyone’
The 10th anniversary tour of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, adapted from the novel by Mark Haddon, comes to Dublin’s Bord Gáis Energy
Juliet Stevenson: ‘My agent said: Go to Hollywood. I thought: I just can’t do this sh*t’
She comes to Galway next month (kind of) in an adaptation of José Saramago’s Blindness
Covid-19: British government criticised after Johnson tests positive
Administration accused of being careless after health minister also sidelined with virus
Kevin Barry: ‘I love reading my work. I’m 98% ham’
You can’t keep the darkly comic writer from the theatre – hardly surprising for a ‘frustrated actor’. He talks about his play Autumn Royal
‘It’s as if Saoirse Ronan was born in the theatre’ - Ivo van Hove
Ahead of a visit to Galway, the Belgian director reveals his vision for theatre, his admiration for Ronan and why he insists that actors tell him they love him
Elvis Costello, Enda Walsh and Hughie O’Donoghue announced for Galway
Suede, a new work inspired by Eileen Gray and US model Cameron Russell are also on the July arts festival bill
‘People might be cross that some English bloke has desecrated a classic’
Director Seán Holmes had never seen The Plough and the Stars staged – until his current version went up at the Abbey Theatre
Peter Crawley’s 2015: Gender and history get a stunning makeover
From DruidShakespeare to Waking the Feminists, 2015 was all about changing perspectives
Crosswords & Puzzles
Crosswords & puzzles to keep you challenged and entertained
Stardust
Inquests into the nightclub fire that led to the deaths of 48 people
Common Ground
How does a post-Brexit world shape the identity and relationship of these islands
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Weddings, Births, Deaths and other family notices