Jody O’Neill

Ballybaile
By Jody O’Neill

“We need to love more
We need to do less
We need to mind each other
We need to stop blaming other people
We need a revolution of thought and of action
We need something better than this.”

Ballybaile is an attempt to represent Ireland in the current moment. It consists of 17 short plays, each named after a government department that explore how decisions and policies made at a governmental level impact on the lives of citizens. Within this structure, it investigates themes of community, isolation, family, climate change, identity, poverty, love and loss.

Jody is a writer and actor, currently based in Wicklow, where she spends much of her time learning about geography, science and the Universe from her seven-year-old son.
She has spent the past two years researching and developing work that promotes autism acceptance. The resulting play, What I (Don’t) Know About Autism, will have its Irish premiere in February 2020. It is a co-production with the Abbey Theatre, and is funded by the Arts Council and Wicklow County Council.Recent work includes: Saying the Words (developed in response to work with Daughters of Charity Blakestown Adult Day Service as part of Draíocht’s ‘Our Place Our Stories’), Scrapefoot (Anu Productions/The Ark) and Yellow (HOME Theatre Ireland/Draíocht).

From 2014-2018, she was a regular script and story writer for RTE’s Fair City.

Bailybaile won a Commendation at the 2019 Awards