New Drama Hour - Series 4

Near FM presents new audio drama ‘Heartburn’, written by Caitlin Magnall-Kearns; directed by Anna Nugent.

Heartburn is a modern take on the rom-com that looks at fatness and friendship. Set over one night in Belfast it follows Chris, a writer, and Lou, a “dinner-lady man” by day and pint puller at night. The two met at university and quickly became friends with benefits. Chris moved back to Belfast, and now, two years later, Lou turns up on her doorstep on New Years Eve with a bottle of prosecco and some questions that need to be answered. Over the night the two reminisce, drink, laugh, eat and try to reckon with their relationship. Can they be mates, should they get together, or should they just call it a day?

Blathnaid McCahilly as Chris

Colm McCready as Lou

Please be advised that the programme contains strong language and sexual content.

Heartburn

Mairead (50s) is thinking of applying for promotion whenever her manager Helen retires. She asks for Helen’s opinion on the matter, confiding in her boss that she’s autistic. Mairead is taken aback when Helen calls her ‘brave’ and ponders why disclosing her neurology should be seen that way.

Through Mairead’s story, our author Maura Campbell explores “why it might be seen as ‘brave’ to apply a word that’s generally represented as something very different in popular culture – usually a young, white guy with savant skills. Autism often looks very different in women and girls, which is why historically we’ve flown under the radar. A lost generation of autistic women are only now discovering their true selves, either because they’ve reached a crisis point in their lives or, like me, their kids have been through the assessment process. Autism tends to be viewed solely as a list of deficits to be ‘treated’, or even as an ‘illness’ to be ‘cured’. Ableist attitudes and the stigmatisation of disability cause people to think it odd that you wouldn’t just want to keep your head down and continue trying to blend in (no matter the cost to your mental health). The story also highlights how there could be real-life consequences as a result of being openly autistic. People do see you differently. It could affect your career progression or mean your opinions are taken less seriously when you speak up at that important meeting. Many autistics choose not to disclose, or in some cases decide not to seek professional identification at all, for this reason. Although the story seeks to make a serious point, it does so with splashes of comedy since the autism myth I most want to smash is the one about us being humourless automatons! We also get a flavour of the little routines and rituals that get Mairead through the day. And there’s a cat.’

Written by Maura Campbell

Mairead played by Mary McNamara

Directed by Declan Cahill

Sound recording and design by Neil Farrelly

Script consultancy by Clare Monnelly

Made with the support of the Coimisiún na Meán’s Sound and Vision scheme through the Television License Fee. The author wishes to thank Hot Coals Productions for their development support.

Brave

‘Togetherness’ tells the story of the narcissistic Dervla who on her agony aunt style podcast ‘Wagon Wheel’ with her long suffering co-host Fidelma recounts the onesided story of a recent breakup with girlfriend Megan while a confused call in listener tries to make sense of the meandering tale.

Written and Directed by Jonathan Hughes

Dervla – Sorcha Curley
Fidelma – Andrea Kelly
Megan – Juliette Crosby
Keven/Deco/Server – Finbarr Doyle

Jonathan Hughes is an award-winning screenwriter and filmmaker based in Limerick City. His scripts have received backing from Screen Ireland, RTE, Galway Film Centre, Clones Film Festival and Dun Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council among others. He holds an MA in Script Writing from Goldsmiths University of London where he received a scholarship to study. In 2019, he was nominated for the prestigious Discovery Award at the Virgin Media Dublin Film Festival. In 2022, he was offered a place on the Channel 4 Screenwriting mentorship scheme when his script finished in the top 1% of applications.

Made with the support of the Coimisiún na Meán’s Sound and Vision scheme through the Television License Fee.

Togetherness

A new audio drama by Colette Cullen.

Two very different couples meet in the waiting room of a fertility clinic – Adam and Sera for their fifth IVF cycle, Jess and Jessicafor their first. As they pass the time chit chatting there are some surprising revelations.

Cast:

Emma Dargan-Reid as Jessica
Siobhan Callaghan as Jess
Lesley Conroy as Sera
Jed Murray as Adam
Directed by Colette Cullen

Made with the support of the Coimisiún na Meán’s Sound and Vision scheme through the Television License Fee.

Fingers Crossed

Konstantin by Ultan Pringle

Konstantin follows the entwined lives of lifelong partners Nina and Allie. Beginning when they’re 18 and setting out to explore the world and finishing when they’re in their late 80s and preparing to leave it, Konstantin is a story of two lives lived and loved side by side. The play jumps through the span of 60 years to explore the relationship and romantic partnership between Allie and Nina. We meet them at 18, arguing in an old decrepit lighthouse about what the future holds. We see them in their early thirties, realising that they’d like to make their lives together and they buy that old lighthouse. We see them at forty, deciding to adopt. Fifty raising two children who turn out to be handfuls. We see them at 60 when they experience a loss which shakes them to their core. We see them at 70, navigating a grief that has to come define them and then finally we see them at 80, failing to make sense of it all but accepting that their lives were worth it and their love was valid. And finally we see them at the very end of their lives, together, waiting for the old lighthouse light to shine. 

Konstantin is an unashamedly queer story which sets out to tell a story radical in its simplicity: the love between two women told delicately over the course of their lives and how their simple act of loving one another is made radical because of its queerness. 

Written and directed by Ultan Pringle

Derbhle Crotty as Allie
Marion O’Dwyer as Nina

Made with the support of the Coimisiún na Meán’s Sound and Vision scheme through the Television License Fee.

Konstantin

Don’t B 2 Keen Mr. Matchmaker by Conrad JB

Ethan, a young Dublin gay man, disillusioned with his prospects of ever owning a house in the capital, sets off to deep rural Ireland in search of a Sugar Daddy. Written as a reaction to John B Keane’s ‘The Matchmaker’, Don’t B 2 Keen Mister Matchmaker explores the transactional feeling of modern day Grindr culture and how that can interact with rural isolation. Queer men’s hook-up apps can show you every man in Dublin who is willing to sleep with you, but if each of those men is still living in their parent’s gaff, what is one to do? Rural isolation is a real problem for countryside communities and LGBTQ+ people suffer heightened levels of loneliness when they feel unable to come out. Can we meet in the middle? Can we be our own Matchmakers?

The play was directed by Anna Nugent

Ethan was played by Robert Downes

Sean, Casper, Daniel, Padraig was played by Emmanuel Okoye

Sharon, Bride to Be, Sive was Maureen O’Connell

Caoimhe, Jackie was played by Biaina Ryan

Made with the support of the Coimisiún na Meán’s Sound and Vision scheme through the Television License Fee.

New Drama Hour - Series 4

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