1710, Rathkeale, County Limerick. A community flees persecution in Germany and is offered land in Ireland that should never have been given.
Refuge traces their journey and explores the enduring connections between displaced communities of the past and those seeking safety today. Deirdre Kinahan's thrilling new play weaves past, present and future: music and magic. Stories of longing, love and loss tear at the human need to find place, a home, a refuge.
It is premiered by Fishamble: The New Play Company and Staatstheater Mainz in 2026.
Deirdre Kinahan is an award-winning playwright and a member of Aosdána, Ireland's elected body of outstanding artists.
Her plays include: Refuge (Fishamble & State Theatre, Mainz, 2026); An Old Song, Half Forgotten (Abbey Theatre, 2023); Outrage (Fishamble, 2022); The Visit (Draiocht, Dublin Theatre Festival 2021); The Saviour (Landmark Productions, 2021); In the Middle of the Fields (Solas Nua DC, 2021); Embargo (Fishamble 2020); Dear Ireland (Abbey Theatre, 2020); The Bloodied Field (Abbey Theatre 2020); Rathmines Road (Fishamble and Abbey Theatre, 2018); Crossings (Pentabus Theatre, 2018); The Unmanageable Sisters, an adaptation of Michel Tremblay's Les Belles Soeurs (Abbey Theatre, Dublin, 2018); Wild Sky (Dublin, 2016); Spinning (Fishamble, 2014); Halcyon Days (Solstice Arts Centre, Co. Meath, and Dublin Theatre Festival, 2012); and Moment (Solstice Arts Centre, Co. Meath, 2009; Bush Theatre, London, 2011).
In 2024, she and actor Bryan Murray were jointly awarded the inaugural Pratchett Prize for challenging the stigma of Alzheimer's Disease, for Kinahan's play An Old Song, Half Forgotten.
