Causes of stress:
Casting plays at the Abbey is a bit like running a race with a plate of jelly. You're constantly keeping an eye on several projects that shift endlessly from day to day. Sometimes you think it's all in the bag but find you are back at square one when an offer to an actor falls through.
Someone may have deep respect for the work of a playwright or director, and he or she may desperately want that particular role, but sometimes it just doesn't work out.
At the moment, we're casting for a very exciting season of some of Tom Murphy's finest plays. The season will mark his contribution to Irish theatre.
We're producing, among others, The Gigli Concert, directed by Ben Barnes, A Whistle In The Dark, directed by Conall Morrison, The Sanctuary Lamp, directed by Lynne Parker, The Morning After Optimism, directed by Gerard Stembridge, and Bailegangaire, directed by the writer himself.
With 19 actors being cast by six directors, you can expect to have quite a busy phone line and cluttered desk, but finalising each cast is a time to celebrate.
Coping with stress:
I shut out the stressful aspects of my job very easily. By the time the DART gets out of that tunnel just beyond Dalkey, and I see the sea, I've pretty much forgotten all the trials of the day. I do, however, carry my interest in my job with me everywhere I go.
I love reading plays and forming a mental picture of the characters involved. It's pure joy when a director sees what you see and when you see those imaginations on stage. Of course, I do read other material, too. I've always been a great reader. I suppose that's my way of coping with stress: to lose myself in someone else's world. I'm not a snob about books. I'd read anything, from the Iliad to the back of a cornflakes packet, and take the same delight in each, so life is always interesting for me.
Coping with competition:
The theatre is always, and probably always will be, in competition with television and film for its actors, and it's great that there is so much more of that work around for Irish actors, but I'm afraid it's one of the banes of my life in casting for the theatre.
In conversation with Elaine Edwards