The Mavens
The Mavens is a female-centric, mentored playwright development programme facilitated by the dlr Mill Theatre in partnership with the Writers Guild of Ireland Project Facilitator and Dramaturg, Pamela McQueen.
The Mavens seeks to explore the representation of aging women from menopausal age onwards in canonical and contemporary playwriting forms. We explore ways in which the mother figure, the non-conformist queer female and the mythic icon female can be reconfigured through an active aging lens.
The Mavens Programme is supported by the Arts Council through the Arts Grant fund. The programme connects established female playwrights with mid-career playwrights. This is an essential connection as mid-career playwrights negotiate the moment when, historically, women artists experience decline between emerging and established careers. It also allows the playwrights to critically reflect on their own female character voices and any internalised self-censorship acquired through working in patriarchal hegemonies.
Personnel
- Kate Canning: Artistic Director and Co-Ordinator of the Mavens Programme
- Pamela McQueen: Project Facilitator and Dramaturg
- Writers Guild of Ireland: recruitment of participants, advice & support
Playwright Mentors
- Noelle Browne
- Deirdre Kinahan
- Michelle Read
- Gina Moxley
✨Announcing Year 4 of the Mavens Professional Development Programme✨
Are you a woman who has written for the stage before? Have you taken a career break? Gotten side tracked by caring responsibilities? Not seen a woman like yourself older and bolder onstage in a while? This may be the paid opportunity with a writing peer group you didn’t know you were looking for.
➡️ We are open to applicants: Deadline for submission: 5pm, Monday November 25th 2024.
A playwright professional development programme providing career support for female identifying writers aged 35+. In a small peer group writers will be paid to explore, through reading and discussion, representation of older female characters on stage with dramaturg Pamela McQueen.
Established Irish female playwrights, Michelle Read, Gina Moxley, Noelle Brown and Deirdre Kinahan will facilitate a group class and one individual mentorship meeting for each participant.
The program includes a paid writing week to create some text and some explorative discussion with the dramaturg to outline a new play. These ideas will be shared in a final session with your fellow playwright participants.
➡️ OPEN CALL/RECRUITMENT – Female playwrights are invited to submit a CV, a five page writing sample and a note describing why you are interested in the Programme. Please send to kate@milltheatre.ie with the subject line: The Maven’s Programme. Deadline for submission: 5pm, Monday November 25th 2024. Candidates will be shortlisted and invited for interview. Four candidates will be selected to participate.
Mavens 2024
- Aisling O’Mara
- Katie McCann
- Collette Cullen
- Joanne Ryan
Mavens 2023
- Una Kavanagh
- Clare Monnelly
- Gillian Grattan
- Katie Holly
Mavens 2022
- Lesley Conroy
- Dee Roycroft
- Elizabeth Moynihan
- Ciara Elizabeth Smyth
The Mavens is an initiative to create a positive policy measure, promoting equal opportunity and access for playwrights of an age and gender that have historically been underserved in the Irish Theatre ecology. As a theatre that regularly produces Shakespeare from the white colonial patriarchal canon, the focus on gender and age ensures diversity in our artistic activities.
This project seeks to upskill, encourage and empower later age female playwrights. We create space for those returning to practise after leaving due to systemic unconscious bias or caring career breaks. The paid structure of this programme is cognisant of reduced socio-economic status due to the inequity of care work of many older female artists. We include travel costs to ensure that location is not a deterrent to applicants. We take other measures to increase accessibility too, including transferring a number of sessions online.
Both the Mavens Programme and the Mavens Lab are supported by the Arts Council.
