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Rachel O’Connor won the Best Actress award in the All Ireland Finals in Athlone at the weekend for her portrayal of Margaret Thatcher in ‘Margaret’, written by Shaun Byrne! We could not have been more delighted to hear Rachel announced as the winner at the Awards Ceremony on Saturday night. Rachel’s husband Sean O’Connor also received a nomination for his stellar performance in Sound, masterfully managing a sound-plot that involved over 100 cues. In addition, lighting technician Sam Asylee received an award in the Newcomer category. After eight nights on the circuit, two local shows, and the Ulster Final in Newtonabbey, all the hard work culminated in the final performance of ‘Margaret’ in the Dean Crowe Theatre in Athlone on…

Don’t miss your last few chances to see ‘Margaret’ by Shaun Byrne, the multi-award winning show produced by Ballyshannon Drama Society, as it wraps up the festival season with two more local performances, a trip north to the Ulster Final, and the All Ireland Final in Athlone in May. ‘Margaret’ is back on the road again this week, with a performance in An Grianan Theatre, Letterkenny, on Friday the 26th of April, and the Ulster Drama Final performance in The Theatre at the Mill in Newtonabbey on Saturday the 27th. The show will return home to Ballyshannon for one final performance in the Abbey Arts Centre, on Monday May 6th, before appearing in the All Ireland Drama Final in the…

‘Margaret’ cleaned up at the Glenamaddy Festival at the weekend, taking home a raft of trophies, including the show’s 5th first place award, which positioned Ballyshannon Drama Society second on the ADCI Open League leaderboard. The prizes included First Place in the Open section, Best Director for Monica Doherty, Best Actress for Rachel O’Connor, Best Set for Shaun Byrne, Monica Doherty and Shaun O’Connor, Best Lighting for Sean O’Connor, with a Best Supporting Actor nomination for Shaun Byrne. With 8 festivals now completed, ‘Margaret’ has finished up with 5 first place, 2 second and 1 third on the leaderboard. The All Ireland finals will take place in Athlone from the 2nd to the 10th of May. The team now await…

‘Margaret’ adds a night in Letterkenny on the road to the All Ireland Drama Festival Finals in Athlone! ‘Margaret’, the award-winning circuit production by Ballyshannon Drama Society, written by Ballybofey’s Shaun Byrne, will run for one night only in An Grianan Theatre, Letterkenny, on Friday, April 26th, 2024.The production has qualified for the All Ireland Drama Festival in Athlone, and taken home multiple awards for actors Rachel O’Connor as Margaret and Shaun Byrne as Dennis, along with awards for director Monica Doherty and the sound and lighting team. This date in the wonderful #angrianantheatre will give audiences in the north of the county an opportunity to see the show and enjoy the sparkling inventiveness of Shaun Byrne’s script, before the…

Congratulations to the cast and crew of ‘Margaret’ on winning the Portadown Drama Festival, their fourth win of the circuit. Rachel O’Connor won Best Actress, and the show took the trophies for Best Stage Management and the Audience Award, with Shaun Byrne receiving a nomination for Best Supporting Actor. Having secured the all-important 36 points by last weekend, this win leaves ‘Margaret’ second in the Open League table, with two more festivals due to report results: the Mid-Mid Ulster Drama Festival (Carrickmore) tonight, and Glenamaddy Theatre Festival next weekend.

And the winners are… Winner of the Open Section (Maureen Gallagher Award): ‘Margaret’ Ballyshannon Drama Society Second Place Open (C. J. King Award): ‘A View From The Bridge’, Prosperous Third Place Open (Jim Flynn Award): ‘Alone It Stands’, Balally Players Best Producer Open (John Stephens Cup): Monica Doherty, ‘Margaret’, Ballyshannon Drama Society Best Actress Open (Eoin Carney Award): Rachel O’Connor as Margaret, ‘Margaret’, Ballyshannon Drama Society Best Actor Open (H. J. Travers Award): Robery Massey, Prosperous First Place Confined (Commercial Hotel Cup): ‘The Lonesome West’, Enniskillen Second Place Confined (Catherine Breslin Award): ‘New Electric Ballroom’, Newtownstewart Third Place Confined: ‘No Going Back’, Castleblayney Players Best Producer Confined (Hugh and Mary Daly Cup): ‘The Lonesome West’, Enniskillen Best Actress Confined (Kathleen…

Tonight, the closing night of the drama festival, we welcome Prosperous and their production of ‘A View From The Bridge’ by Arthur Miller. A View from the Bridge premiered in 1956. Set in an Italian-American neighborhood on the Brooklyn side of the Brooklyn Bridge, the play follows the unraveling of Eddie Carbone following the arrival of two of his wife’s cousins from Italy. Eddie is obsessed with his niece, Catherine, and is threatened by her relationship with one of the cousins. Prosperous Dramatic Society, from the village of Prosperous in Co Kildare has a treasured history of community-based theatre for over 100 years. The group has a broad membership, with ages from 7 – 70+ and operates from its own…

Tonight at the drama festival, we welcome Balally Players and their production of ‘Alone It Stands’ by John Breen. Alone It Stands tells the story of the 1978 rugby union match at Thomond Park between Irish provincial side, Munster, and the New Zealand national team, the All Blacks. A multitude of different, fictional, made- up fairy tales interlink to convey the hype and, indeed, “pashun” running up to and during the big match. Stories of birth, tragedy and building bonfires prevail, as the play charts the personal stories of various characters and their whereabouts on the momentous day. In the play, six actors play 62 roles including the Munster team, the New Zealanders playing on the All Blacks team, the…