Meet Our MFA Playwriting Tutors
The tutors on our MFA in Playwriting are some of the most exciting literary minds working in Irish theatre today. Meet them in this overview below.
Graham Whybrow - Course Director
Graham Whybrow is Course Director of the MFA in Playwriting. He was Literary Manager of the Royal Court Theatre in London for twelve years (1994–2007), when it premiered more than 200 new plays and launched a new generation of over 50 playwrights including Marina Carr, Conor McPherson, Sarah Kane, Jez Butterworth, Martin McDonough and Mark Ravenhill.
Thomas Conway - Contemporary Theatre Tutor
Thomas Conway is the new writing manager with the Gate Theatre, Dublin. He has taught drama at many third-level institutions, including Trinity College Dublin, University of Galway and The Lir, National Academy of Dramatic Art. During his time as literary manager with Druid, he gave dramaturgical support to world premières by Tom Murphy, Enda Walsh, Stuart Carolan, Lucy Caldwell, Meadhbh McHugh and Nancy Harris and to revivals of plays by Eugene O’Neill, Martin McDonagh, Sean O’Casey, Tom Murphy, Shakespeare (adapted by Mark O’Rowe) and Samuel Beckett, among others. He also adapted Shakespeare’s Richard III.
He has edited The Oberon Anthology of Contemporary Irish Plays (2012), bringing into print for the first time the work of Amy Conroy, Mark O’Halloran, Philip McMahon, Lynda Radley, Una McKevitt and Grace Dyas. He has edited two volumes of plays by Tom Murphy: DruidMurphy: Plays by Tom Murphy (2012) and The Mommo Plays (2014). Dramaturgy for independent theatre makers and choreographers includes work with Michael Keegan Dolan, Pan Pan Theatre Company, Una McKevitt, Dick Walsh, and Painted Bird - the latter an ongoing collaboration with director, Fiona McGeown, to investigate women’s experiences throughout 20th century Ireland. He has been a tutor at Drama League of Ireland’s Summer School and has given workshops to drama groups all over Ireland.
Gavin Kostick
Gavin Kostick has written over twenty plays for a wide range of companies, which have been produced in Dublin and have toured internationally. Gavin has provided dramaturgical support for dozens of theatrical productions throughout Ireland and he is also the Literary Manager for Fishamble: The New Play Company.
You can read an article from 2018 when we presented Gavin's play The Ash Fire here.
Karin McCully
Karin McCully holds an MFA in Dramaturgy and Dramatic Criticism from The Yale School of Drama. She was the first full-time resident Dramaturg at the Abbey Theatre where she subsequently became Literary Manager. She has thirty years experience as a professional dramaturg and lecturer in Theatre History and Dramaturgy having taught at Yale, UCLA, IADT, UCD and Trinity College Dublin.
Karin is the Literary Manager for Rough Magic Theatre Company.
Michael West - Theatre in Context Tutor
Michael is a playwright and dramaturg with an extensive career in Irish theatre. He also teaches scriptwriting at the Seamus Heaney Centre at Queen’s University, Belfast and his plays are published by Methuen.
Michael West has had a long association with The Corn Exchange with whom he
collaborated on many works over the last 25 years. These include: The Fall of the Second Republic (in a co-production with the Abbey 2020); The Seagull (Dublin Theatre Festival, 2016); the first stage adaptation of Joyce’s Dubliners for 2012 (and Smock Alley in 2022); Man of Valour (2011); Freefall (Dublin Theatre Festival, 2009, winner of the Irish Theatre Award and Irish Writers Guild award for best play); Everyday (Dublin Theatre Festival, 2006); and Dublin by Lamplight (2004) which was revived by the Abbey Theatre in 2017.
In collaboration with TEAM, he has written two plays for children: Forest Man and Jack
Fell Down. He has also written several short plays for RTE Radio, including The Death of
Naturalism and Sound Waves.
He has worked extensively in translation with his work presented at the Abbey Theatre, Gate Theatre, in Avignon, Theatre Royal, Bath. His work has been produced by La Comédie de
Reims, by Anne Bogart’s SITI company, Theatre Lovett, .Williamstown Theatre Festival, the Wannamaker Playhouse at the Globe,
His adaptation of Mike McCormack’s Solar Bones played at the Abbey Theatre in 2023 and was the winner of Best Actor and Best Director at the Irish Theatre Awards.
