Séamus McLean Ross and Aoise Meaney will star in the new production of Disco Pigs at the Everyman in Cork. Picture: Raaz Praveen
Disco Pigs was the Cork play that launched the careers of Cillian Murphy and Eileen Walsh, and now a new pair of young actors are stepping into the roles for the 30th-anniversary production.
Running from October 31 at the Everyman in Cork, playwright Enda Walsh is also returning to his old stomping ground to direct the new production of his hugely-successful work. The play originally debuted at Triskel in 1996 before it went onto international acclaim and also spawned a film version.
The 59-year-old Dubliner and his team spent much of the early part of this year sifting through about 150 self-tapes before hosting face-to-face auditions in Cork, Dublin, and the UK. Finally, they’re able to reveal the leads in the two-handed play: Scottish actor Séamus McLean Ross will take on the role of Pig, while Co Clare actress Aoise Meaney is the new Runt.
The Dundee actor is the more experienced of the two, having popped up in such shows as the recent BBC reboot of Rebus, and he will also be appearing opposite Isla Fisher and Colin Firth in forthcoming film Bare. He’s also no stranger to the world of showbiz as his parents are Ricky Ross and Lorraine McIntosh of Scottish pop group Deacon Blue (Real Gone Kid, etc).
Meaney is making her professional stage debut at the Everyman, but has been acting since her school days in Co Clare, and is a recent graduate of the Royal Welsh College of Music & Drama.
Preparations for the play step up a gear with rehearsals in September, and one of the key members of the production team will be vocal coach Irene O’Mara, who will guide the duo through the peculiar dialogue of Walsh’s script, a sort of combination of Corkspeak and the Nadsat slang of A Clockwork Orange.
Walsh, who is now based in the UK and has since penned or directed numerous major stage productions and films – including an upcoming movie remake of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang – is delighted to square the circle with Disco Pigs.
“I love Cork and its people and it’s a real joy, and an absolute honour, to bring Disco Pigs back to the stage in the Everyman,” said Walsh. “I hope I can repay Cork’s support of me when I was a younger playwright with a thumping new production. With Aoise Meaney and Séamus McLean Ross – I could not be more excited.”
The Everyman’s artistic director Des Kennedy was the one who first suggested the anniversary revival of the play. "We’re thrilled that Enda is coming back to Cork to direct one of the most important plays in the Irish canon in the city where it all began,” said Kennedy.
“Nobody knows these characters better than Enda and, after an extensive search, he has found two extraordinary young actors to be his Pig and Runt. We can’t wait to welcome Séamus and Aoise to the Everyman."
