2.Main Content
Talent
Oonagh Kearney
Oonagh Kearney
Oonagh Kearney was born in Bristol in 1976. Raised in Cork, she studied English and Philosophy at University College Cork where she began writing and directing for the stage. She completed her masters in Irish Theatre at Trinity College Dublin and wrote her thesis on Samuel Beckett. In 2001, she was selected for the Rough Magic Seeds Program for emerging Irish playwrights.
Her introduction to film began with casting Ken Loach’s The Wind That Shakes the Barley in 2005. The following year, Oonagh received a Bank of Ireland Scholarship to study at the National Film and Television School in London. Since graduating in 2008, Oonagh has written and directed award-winning shorts and shown her work at various international festivals.
As a filmmaker, she likes to explore characters at critical moments of change often connected to defining rites of passage. She is interested in the configuration and representation of female identity, the impact of family, the tensions between our private and public selves, and the role of play and imagination in our lives. Working across diverse visual mediums including fiction, documentary and dance on film, she is fascinated by the relationship between art and life.
During She Writes, Oonagh worked on the feature, We The Unrequited.
We The Unrequited
by Oonagh Kearney
The road to love is long and winding.
Alice needs to start living again. Two years ago, her boyfriend disappeared off the side of a mountain. Her parents and older brother worry about her but she deals with the vortex of grief by avoiding it. On New Year’s Day, she looks out her flat window in London and sees a figure bundled up in the snow. After rescuing Dara, an Irish actor, Alice feels reconnected to life. They meet up and a love story gently begins to unfold. Alice invites Dara to an opening at her brother’s art gallery. Confronted by the image of a woman he recognizes, Dara leaves without explanation.
We The Unrequited is a compassionate story about two Londoners desperately trying to overcome their pasts in order to map a true line into their future.
During She Writes Oonagh has been mentored by producer Kate Ogborn.
Oonagh can be contacted at:
oonagh@oonaghkearney.com
m: 07791 060665
www.oonaghkearney.com