All My Friends Are in Australia opens tour at Rua Red

“TRUDY’S stuck in Dublin. Her best friend’s down under. She’s not dead. She’s just on a working visa,” explains Lucy Barton of LEGROOM Collective.

Interactive comedy ‘All My Friends Are in Australia’ returns to Ireland this autumn with an opening show in Rua Red marking the start of seven performances across Dublin, Portlaoise, Galway, Longford and Kildare.

In a country where it can sometimes feel like everyone is leaving, the show turns the experience of long-distance friendship into an “electric”, participatory night out.

Theatregoers will be entering a binding contract with Trudy (whether they like her or not). Instead of simply watching Trudy’s crisis unfold, they will become Trudy’s half-marathon motivators, party plus-ones and

“quarter-life crisis comforters”.

Together, they will enter Trudy’s vibrant, oddly personal, and, at times, unsettling hybrid yoga/spin-class meets karaoke-nightclub extravaganza…

As the creators, Lucy and Caoimhe Farrell were inspired by their own situation for the story, as a majority of their friends from school and university have since moved away.

Lucy moved to London after university, but Caoimhe stayed in Ireland, and they wanted to “continue our creative partnership”.

The show continues to be a “long-distance creation”, which is something they find “really special”.

They were also “very inspired” by their own feelings of uncertainty and fear about the future, which is why they decided to make the show interactive to create a moment of

“shared joy and understanding” through theatre and comedy.

Although they are both creators, Lucy writes the show, while Caoimhe directs; this has meant it has been a “really fun collaborative project rather than a strict writer-director relationship”.

Highlights so far have included the ACTIVATE residency at Backstage Theatre Longford, which “truly enriched the project so much and gave us in-person time together to develop the piece further”.

Another highlight has been recent shows at Galway Theatre Festival and Cork Fringe, and they are excited to be returning to Galway in October after selling out their original slot in May.

Developing this at a distance has been a challenge, but one that they feel has actually made the piece stronger and more layered, because they are actively experiencing that distance.

Another challenge has been getting the funding and time to develop the show and put it in front of an audience, all while balancing other jobs and creative projects.

LEGROOM has also recently curated The Meeting Room as part of the Liberties Festival with Gabriela Waclawska, which was an evening showcasing emerging artists from multiple disciplines.

They hope to be able to make this a regular thing, as well as our new workshop, Wiggle Room, which helps people of all levels develop skills in participatory arts.

Lucy and Caoimhe would like to thank Michael McDermott, director of the Liberties Festival; Mona Considine, artistic director of Backstage Theatre Longford; current cast members Juliette Christle and Siobhán Matshazi; as well as original cast members Éabha Fitzpatrick and Amy Scollard.

They acknowledge producer Fionnuala Maher and the crew, as well as the funding they have received from SDCC Arts, Kildare County Council, Backstage Theatre Longford and TCD Alumni.

Finally, they would like to extend their gratitude to supporting festivals Liberties Festival, Culture Date with D8, Cork Fringe, Rialto Community Festival, LASTA Festival and Galway Theatre Festival.

‘All My Friends Are In Australia’ opens its newest tour in Rua Red on September 11 at 7pm; for more details, be sure to check their Instagram page.