How I Got Here: Playwright Erica Murray

When did you begin your career?

It started really when I began studying drama. None of my family were interested in theatre, but I had two friends in the Limerick Youth Choir who were a year ahead of me in school, Marc Atkinson Borrull and Liam McCarthy. They were really ahead of their time: they set up their own theatre company, Histrionics, when they were about sixteen and we just did plays over the summer. We put on Midsummer Night’s Dream in an old church and the like – it was just great fun! They headed off to study drama at Trinity and I would visit them. I saw the DU Players and the free reign they had over theatre. It was just the best thing I could imagine. So I basically just copied Marc and Liam!

What does a typical day look like for you?

Outside the frenzied periods of rehearsals, previews and openings, I work to my own schedule. If I don’t stick to a routine I just flounder so I try to be at my desk by 10am each morning. I find it hard to concentrate on writing for more than a few hours, but up until 1pm is my focus time. I keep my meetings to the afternoon because that’s when things start to lag. I’ve tried writing all day, but it just doesn’t work for me, and I’ve had to learn to forgive myself for that. Now, I try to set targets for the week so if things go a bit sideways on Monday, I can make it up by Friday.

What parts of your role do you find most fulfilling?

Listening to the audience. Once the stress of previews is done and it’s all live, there’s something really satisfying about listening to an audience react to something in the moment you’re hoping they’ll react. You can just tell when an audience is really engaged and that’s extremely addictive and extremely special.

What are the most challenging parts for you?

I think it’s probably filtering in notes. For Loved Ones, for example, there were two production companies that had notes flying at me from all directions. You have to be so careful and really sift through everything, while at the same time holding onto the heart of the play or the thing you’re trying to say. You have to drown out the noise and figure out what notes you want to keep, what does the note behind that note mean: what are they really trying to say? It’s so hard to keep a grasp of my own sense of the play during that period. I have to hold my ground but also listen, it’s a constant compromise.

What are the biggest challenges facing people in the arts in 2024?

It’s probably the lack of security. There are a few brilliant places where you can get support like the Irish Theatre Institute. I was lucky enough to work with them for a year: I had a desk space and people around to talk to whenever I was in a bit of a muddle. So many people don’t have that kind of resource because they don’t have a set place where they work, it’s always project to project. I remember starting out and feeling very at sea, but places like Irish Theatre Institute are tonic for that and I wish there was more of them.

Where do you find inspiration?

It’s a hard thing to put my finger on, sometimes characters just come into my head. When I can’t stop thinking about them, that’s when I know there’s something there. It could be a character, or dialogue or a scene. Usually it’s two characters just talking to one another, often just as I’m falling asleep and I have to grab my phone to take notes.

What are you working on now?

I have an idea, I haven’t even written it down yet but I’m thinking about it a lot and writing notes. Right now, I know who the people are, what their personalities are like and what they might be fighting about, but I’m just not clear on what the through line is yet. Hopefully, when I get around to putting it down on paper, it’ll become clearer.

Irish female playwrights to watch

It’s a really exciting time for Irish female playwrights. Waking the Feminists happened in 2015 when I was doing my Masters, and it was so disheartening to wonder if anyone was ever going to program me. Now, years later, we’re starting to see more and more female writers being commissioned for the big stages and by big companies. It feels very normal in a great way.

Nancy Harris, playwright and screenwriter of 2022’s The Dry. Her play, Somewhere Out There You, premiered at The Abbey. Janet Moran’s Quake was in The Samuel Beckett. Joanne Ryan is a fellow Limerick playwright, Fishamble produced her play Between Two Minds. Karen Egan is another. And that’s to name just a few.

This article originally appeared in the Spring 2024 issue of IMAGE.