First encounters

In conversation with FRANCES O'ROURKE

GRACE DYAS

is a 22-year-old writer/director who grew up in Rialto and Thomas Street in Dublin. One-third of THEATREclub theatre collective, she devised Heroin, a play which won the Spirit of the Fringe award at the 2010 Absolut Dublin Fringe festival. It was the first of a trilogy that includes The Family, in the 2011 festival and History, a history of housing in Ireland and of the community of St Michael's estate in Inchicore, due in 2013

'THE FIRST TIME I heard of Dylan was through Willie White, who invited him to do a workshop in Dublin Youth Theatre. Dylan had done so much and was our age. He'd just finished the film Roll Up Your Sleeves. I was intrigued and a bit intimidated. We [Shane Byrne, Doireann Coady and Grace formed THEATREclub in 2008] hadn't really done anything yet. Then I saw him in November 2008 when Everyone Loves Sylvia, directed by Wayne Jordan, was on in the Project. I saw this young fella with a big coat and long hair. He looked about seven, and he'd just been appointed to the board of the Project.

“I didn’t talk to him but saw him after the show: he was so confident, he engaged in a robust critical conversation with Wayne. I was a bit shy around him. Then in November 2009, I went to Change, Dylan’s week-long event . I was completely inspired by his confidence, determination, his world view. He had a motorbike! And he was very much the leader of the Change project, with lots of different speakers. I was moved: a lot of what I think about art for social change is influenced by that.

"It was an exciting time in the Project, it was an awakening, the Woodstock of our lives. So then Dylan became part of our lives, my life, a collaborator, a friend. I was working on Heroin– the play was already in my mind, I'd received a research grant and I thought, 'who do I need on this project?', and asked him. He was on the board of the Project but had no practical experience of contemporary performance. It really worked. Anytime we didn't understand each other it helped me to refine what I was thinking. He was my sounding board.

"Dylan would really challenge me. I was afraid Heroinwould fail because of my social background, my bias towards the addicts. I asked him to constantly question me. The fact that our backgrounds – he's from the southside, I'm from Rialto – are very different was never an issue. Project Arts Centre brings people from very different backgrounds together and Dublin Youth Theatre is a melting pot of social backgrounds. It annoys me that that's not normal.

“I took the idea that I’m capable of, and responsible for, changing things from my background – my father was involved in community development. I think Dylan got a lot from his grandfather, [former RTÉ broadcaster] John O’Donoghue. Now Dylan and I are very much personal friends, a friendship based on making both of us the best we can possibly be. Doireann and Shane are my childhood friends; Dylan’s one of my early-20s friends. Our friendship is grounded in manic ambition to change the world.”

DYLAN HASKINS

is 24 and stood as an independent candidate in last year’s general election in Dublin South-East. Active in Dublin’s music and art scene since he was at secondary school in Bray, he made a documentary about the DIY ethos, Roll up Your Sleeves, became a social activist and entrepreneur, and is on the board of Project Arts Centre. He is in his final year at Trinity College, Dublin

‘OBAMA HAD JUST been elected, everything was about change . . . so two friends and I got space in the Project in January 2009 and organised a week of exhibitions and discussions that we called Change. It was the first time I really met Grace, although we’d met briefly before. She sent me an email before Change saying, ‘you don’t know me but I’d love to come along’.

“Grace was very ‘I wanna change the world’ . . . and so do I, absolutely. And it was great to meet someone else like that. If anyone asks me about other young people who are doing things in Dublin, she’s always the first person who springs to mind.

“Change felt like it was the beginning of something. I grew up thinking everything was permanent: when everything collapsed, we realised everything can be changed. There was a feeling of, what’s next? We wanted to get an all-ages gig space, and got a grant for €18,000. Temple Bar Cultural Trust gave us space which had been Haus furniture shop – where apparently there’d once been a sofa for sale for €50,000 – at a very reduced rent. We started the arts collective that became Exchange Dublin. I was co-opted to the board of Project around the same time. “I got in touch with Grace to see if she and her group THEATREclub would be involved. Then they started a festival – The Theatre Machine Turns You On – that ran into conflict with the ethos of Exchange, where nobody’s paid. There were some very heated debates on this, particularly between myself and Grace, the only time there’s been real tension between us.

"But we stayed good friends. Then Grace invited me to work on her play Heroinas assistant director. It was my first time working properly on a show and I found it one of the most fulfilling creative processes I've been involved in.

“Grace is great at drawing people to see the show who mightn’t normally go to theatre, there’s no snobbery in her approach. I learnt a lot working with her, going down to Fatima for rehearsals, being immersed in a community so removed from my own experience.

“After the December 2010 Budget, I decided to run for election, getting over a quarter of the quota. I wouldn’t rule out politics in the future, but for now I want to focus on broadcasting and documentary film-making. I might go to London. I know Grace and I diverge on this: she would say, why would I leave when the stories I want to tell are all Irish? We’ll stay friends. We’re still interested in the same things. I have an idea for a documentary series very similar to some of her theatre ideas. It’s totally about ideas, being able to argue with each other without getting offended.”