The Big Deal Coming to Project Arts Centre October 31st-November 5th

The Big Deal at Project Arts Centre from projectarts on Vimeo.

Review of The Big Deal Irish Theatre Magazine

The Big Deal is a compelling portrayal of exceptional friends in exceptional circumstances. Although born male, Cathy and Deborah – formerly Patrick and Sean – grew up identifying as female, undergoing gender reassignment surgery as adults. Drawing on interviews, diaries and letters exchanged between the pair as they transitioned during the 1990s, The Big Deal is a moving and unflinching portrayal of lives rarely accounted for in Irish culture, let alone on the Irish stage.

The Big Deal Kilkenny Arts Festival August 10th-14th


Dear Cathy,

It’s 10.30pm on Tuesday night. I have just finished your recent email. You are now on the way to recovery. You are here now as you should have been and will be until the day you die. So whilst I struggle slowly onward and upward, you are already there.

Love Deborah

Irish Theatre Magazine Director's Diary Una McKevitt on The Big Deal


Una McKevitt, a Dublin-based theatre practitioner, describes her documentary theatre craft and the background to her latest work,
The Big Deal, which opens at Kilkenny Arts Festival this week:
On Thursday August 5th, actors Una Kavanagh and Shani Williams did a run through of our new show The Big Deal without a script for the first time. I'm a Project Catalyst at Project Arts Centre and we’re teching the show there this week in preparation for the Kilkenny Arts Festival. During the run through there was some stopping and starting but that was to be expected as the script was only finalised the day before.

Front Lines The Irish Times Sat July 30th 2011

True characters
Una McKevitt, theatre maker
Tell us about your new play . . . The Big Deal is about two women’s experiences of having been born into the wrong bodies and their struggles to rectify this situation throughout their lives.

Your plays draw on real-life experiences and real-life texts . . . I think everyone has the most extraordinary life - just getting up and going about your day and falling asleep. It’s the ordinary detail that I find most revealing.