Oakhill Players Launch Playwright Competition

If you have a creative streak or have ever thought about writing for the stage, then this

might be just the opportunity for you.

The Oak Hill players have just launched a brand new playwright competition as part of

their popular pint-sized plays series inviting people to submit an original short play of

10 minutes or less.

So to find out more about the competition, how people can get involved, I just joined by

Veronica Keating from the Oak Hill Players and Competition Committee member, Faye Collins,

Faye and Veronica.

Very good morning to both of you.

Good morning, Alan.

Thanks very much for being with us.

And Veronica, you've been with us before on the Oak Hill Players.

This is a new venture, this playwright competition.

The competition is a new venture.

As you know, anytime we've been on before, sometimes I've been on promoting the pint-sized

plays.

So there are plays that take place in a pub setting, that's where the pint-sized comes

from.

And it's usually with you with an education.

Absolutely.

You might have five, six on a night.

You might have three depending, ten minutes each, little gap in between.

They can be about anything.

So when they were originally set up, my sister, who's the chief cook and bottle washer in

Oak Hill Players with Faye, used English ones, obviously, because that's all that was

available out there, because this is where all they started.

And they used to have to modify them.

Sometimes they used them as they were, but sometimes the humour maybe didn't translate

as well, so they modified them.

What were you, Niki?

I wish production.

Absolutely.

They used to modify them.

I think they've been thinking over the last two years, wouldn't it be great if we had

access to Irish ones that were uniquely Irish?

So they've been fermenting away for a while, so they bit the bullet a few months back

and said, well, we just go ahead and do it, we'll launch competition.

So it is a competition for ten minutes pint-sized plays and all that that entails.

You know, the constraints that are on a pub setting, that's ten minutes long.

And they can be about absolutely anything.

We were just saying, if you, you know, they say everybody has a book in them, everybody

probably has a ten minute play in them.

Or if you felt the need to, yeah, I can write something.

I've got a story in me, but you're a bit daunted by the writing of a long story.

Ten minutes can be done.

And this is something Faye has spoken about, I think, with Veronica before, when she's

been in talk, it is about the pint-sized plays.

That, yeah, on that one side, you can say, well, you know, ten minutes, that's grand.

It's not like I'm having to come up with a three hour godfather or style epic here.

But also, because it's ten minutes max, you're kind of have to really have your thinking

cap on because you have to have a coherent structured play that you maybe, you know, has

a beginning in middle and an end, and that people can get invested in, all in ten minutes

or less.

Absolutely.

As you said, it has to have a star in a middle and an end.

You have to have characters, people can, you know, get behind, yeah, exactly.

And all of that has to come from ten minutes of showing people and, yeah, like with the

pint-sized plays, you're kind of dropping the audience in the middle of a story and just,

you know, carrying on from there and doing what you can with it.

But yeah, it's such a good opportunity now for anyone that's ever thought of writing

or, you know, a creative individual and, you know, it's dipping your toe in the space

and if something you've never been interested in either and think, you know what, I might

throw my hat in the ring for this, it's a great opportunity and, as Veronica said as

well, there is no limit to what you can do with this, like we were the ones we've done

before.

There's been two cows in a milk and parlor talking about the bull of the farm and, you know,

there's ten minutes in the dogs.

Two dogs.

That was really good.

Two very depressed poor dogs.

It's depressed dogs.

It could be about absolutely anything.

It can be funny.

It can be dramatic.

It can be such.

It's whatever you want it to be.

Okay.

So, Veronica, there's no limit in terms of whether you want to go with comedy, tragedy,

or any drama, whatever it might be.

The tone is completely up to whoever's writing it.

But what will the judges be looking out for when reviewing the entries?

What are some of the kind of key criteria or maybe you want to answer this fade?

Maybe you're hoping applicants or entrants, what boxes you hope they will take.

Absolutely.

So, well, because it's a competition, we do have certain criteria and rules that people

who are submitting half to 12.

Time limit has been a key one.

Time limit, you know, it has to be ten minutes or under.

A lot of the point size plays are under ten minutes.

You're limited to three actors.

That can be more than three characters, but it has to be played by three actors and

minimal use of texts and props, because it's, you know, meant to, you know, be able

to be carried out in a pop setting where you don't have access to that stuff.

And, you know, you have to get creative with all that stuff as well, but those are the

main three kind of points.

And it's, I suppose it's one entry per person as well as another point, but yeah, I suppose

the judges will be looking for story for characters.

And I suppose it's important to mention as well, anyone that's submitting, we have an

opportunity to take part in a lovely writing workshop to help our playwrights in kind

of flesh and out their story and, you know, getting a bit of feedback and taking it where

it needs to go, which is also great.

Okay.

Yeah, that's, and that is a nice addition to it as well.

Yeah.

Actually, it is just about the playwrighting, because we've actually had questions about

this before.

Some people were going, oh, but I couldn't act and I couldn't put it on the stage.

It's absolutely nothing to do with that.

So this is purely about the writing.

And if you want to run off with your play after that and do whatever you like with it,

that's fine.

Or if you would like to see it maybe acted out, that can be all negotiated at a later

date.

Okay.

You would think though, if someone is successful in this, having written a play, they

would want to see it.

Of course.

You would hope, anyway.

Okay.

Who knows?

Exactly.

All sorts of people out there.

Yeah.

So look at the application process, submission process is open already.

Fay, how long do people have and, you know, where do they apply by email or how is it all

working?

Yeah.

So right now our entry form is open for the competition.

So you have until April 30th to submit the entry form.

And again, you don't have to have your play written by April 30th.

It's just the entry form.

All we're looking for is name and contact info.

And that's basically just submitting your interest for the competition.

Don't need to have any draft or anything done at that stage.

After April 30th, then we'll have our workshop followed shortly after that.

And then the final draft will have to be submitted by May 30th.

So there's a lot of time to get going, to get the pens going.

You can find the email or the entry form on our Instagram, which is okill.players on

our Facebook, okill players, or if you don't have any social media or anything, you can

email us at okillplayers26 at gmail.com and we can, we can send on the entry form.

Okay.

And I guess to finish round again, an important thing maybe to point out to people is if

you try to use chat GBT to write this, it'll be very easily spotted.

Yes, it will.

So it's in the rules, it is very evident and we've been testing it out and it is extremely

evident when chat GBT is used.

So use, you know, be as original as you can absolutely, absolutely, absolutely.

Any excuse to use the heads is good at this stage, definitely is keep that gray matter working.

Okay, really interesting idea and be curious to see what kind of productions and entrants

that emerge from this.

And I'm sure we'll touch base with you on that later on in the year.

My thanks to both of you for having me and Faye Collins from the okill players and you

have all the details there if you want to get writing.