Sean Riley Sean Riley i(A73206 works by)
Born: Established: 1967 Burnie, Burnie area, Northwest Tasmania, Tasmania, ;
Gender: Male
The material on this page is available to AustLit subscribers. If you are a subscriber or are from a subscribing organisation, please log in to gain full access. To explore options for subscribing to this unique teaching, research, and publishing resource for Australian culture and storytelling, please contact us or find out more.

Works By

Preview all
1 1 Lambs Sean Riley , 2024 single work drama war literature

'Free Agents Youth Theatre presents the world premiere of LAMBS - a theatrical exploration of the experiences of underage boys who enlisted in WWI. From 1914 to 1918, thousands of Australian boys lied about their ages, and went off to fight in a war on the other side of the world. They found they could die as well as any man, but they could never grow old. Like Peter Pan's lost boys, they have remained forever young. Over a hundred years later, they're all gone...but how do we remember them? This profoundly moving work by Sean Riley features a cast of Adelaide's finest young actors and creatives.' (Production summary)

1 y separately published work icon This Bloody House Sean Riley , 2018 13972703 2018 single work drama

'Award-winning playwright Sean Riley's latest play for emerging adults is a modern retelling of The Oresteia – the epic trilogy from the classical Greek theatre canon  that charts the destruction of literature’s most dysfunctional family; Agamemnon and his wife Clytemnestra, and their children Electra and Orestes. 

'Set somewhere in suburban Adelaide, a family rips itself apart in the time-honoured tradition of Greek tragedy.

'In its classically staged form, The Oresteia runs a staggering five and a half hours, but  This Bloody House is an adrenalin-fuelled eighty minutes, reimagined and relocated in the dark underbelly of contemporary society.    In a world of violence, drugs, guns, and biker gang warfare, this family are now the most dangerous of criminal dynasties.  Brutal, retributive, and unforgiving, the plays are awash with familial rivalries, jealousies and revenge.'

Source: Bakehouse Theatre.

1 The Visitors Sean Riley , 2013 single work drama

'“Dad has become a stranger. I feel like a visitor in my own home.”'

'Sixteen-year-old Max is becoming an angry young man, seduced by risk and danger. Eleven-year-old Darcy has become too big for his boots, alienating friends and teachers alike and fourteen year old Chloe (through whose eyes we view the story) is silently noticing a change in Tom, their Dad…Little changes, at first, but later…'

'As months pass, Tom’s condition worsens; his behaviour growing ever more strange and unpredictable. The fabric of this tight-knit family is stretched to its limits. Loyalties are tested and blood-ties challenged, and when hard decisions need to be made, this family drama builds to an explosive and heartwrenching conclusion.' (Source: http://comeoutfestival.com.au/events/the_visitors )

1 y separately published work icon Brilliant Monkey [and] Skip Miller's Hit Songs Al Dukes , Sean Riley , Strawberry Hills : Currency Press , 2012 Z1929348 2012 selected work drama
1 Skip Miller's Hit Songs Sean Riley , 2011 single work drama
— Appears in: Brilliant Monkey [and] Skip Miller's Hit Songs 2012; (p. 41-94)
'Skip Miller doesn't take pretty pictures but he collects good music. A celebrated frontline photojournalist, he has spent years documenting the war zones of Africa and the faces of the dispossessed. A homeless wanderer amidst millions, Skip is on an endless search for the next assignment - the next best shot.

Meanwhile in a refugee camp, Basil Mgembe searches for his missing family and, in Australia, the newly arrived Patience Lugor comes face to face with her own image on bus shelters and billboards, in newspapers and magazines.

This multi-narrative ensemble work for African and Australian actors and musicians is an intimate, honest and open-hearted exploration of lives caught between two worlds.' (Producer's blurb)
1 form The Angel and the Red Priest Sean Riley , 2006 single work drama radio play

'In 1713 Antonio Vivaldi (known as The Red Priest) was a composer-in-residence at the Ospedale della Pieta, an orphanage for girls, in Venice.

'In Sean Riley's first radio drama, he constructs a fictional encounter between Vivaldi and an orphan girl, Agatha, who posseses the voice of an angel, but is hideously deformed. Vivaldi composes a mass to feature Agatha's superb voice, but is it intended to help or exploit Agatha?'

Source: ABC Radio National website, http://www.abc.net.au/rn/airplay/stories/2006/1732451.htm
Cited: 10 October 2006

1 1 Significant Others Sean Riley , 2004 single work drama
1 1 y separately published work icon Beautiful Words Sean Riley , 2004 Strawberry Hills : Currency Press , 2008 Z1101386 2004 single work drama children's

'An epic chronicle of the refugee experience, Beautiful Words weaves together three very different stories of survival, told through the eyes of three children in different times and places. The outcome is heart-rending, humorous, and surprising by turns. From the horrors of Auschwitz Concentration Camp in the final days of World War II, to Taliban-ruled Kabul, to present day Australia, this enthralling play presents a rich tapestry of human experience, overlapping lives, and the bonds that unite generations.'

Source: Currency Press website, http://www.currency.com.au/
Sighted: 12/05/2008

1 The Last Acre Sean Riley , 2003 single work drama

We know, and absolutely don’t want to know, how a single action, a single impulse can change everything. This is what we mean by a life-or-death moment, that split second, as we call it, when something irrevocable occurs and it can’t be changed back. This is the moment that can’t be believed even when it is re-lived repeatedly, the moment that is still true when you wake up the next day. It is when we know our lives are never going to be the same again. "The Last Acre" is a good play which has been brought to the stage by a dedicated and very able company. As a study of family it conjures contradictions and complex intimacies vividly and unsentimentally, as a portrait of a family paralysed, both actually and metaphorically, it is able to show resolution and some hope without being simplistic.

(Source: Trove)

X