Getting You Ready For Your Close-Up

Imogen Doel TUES23JUNE26

he’s a hard woman to keep up with, that young Imogen Doel.

One minutes she’s studying French and art history in UCD, the next she’s treading the boards in that London.

Such a restless spirit is, of course, crucial for anyone who regularly lives in the parallel universe of the arts, and with Ms Doel, that restlessness has her bouncing between acting, writing, teaching, directing and whatever-you’re-having-yourself.

“Well, it’s all connected,” she says on this ridiculously sunny Tuesday afternoon down on Church Road. “It’s not as though an actor doesn’t think about the writing, or a writer doesn’t think about the performance, or that everyone involved doesn’t think about the production as a whole. It’s all one.

“Every bit of this process is joyful, so how could I resist…?”

The first temptation of Imogen Doel was at UCD, when it slowly dawned that she was spending far more time with the amateur dramatics gang than she was at her actual classes. From there, it was a hop, skip and a cheap plane ride to the London Academy Of Music & Dramatic Art, followed by a job at The Royal Court, working with one of her two main heroes, Anthony Neilson (the other inspiration being Annie Baker).

“I learnt so much there, and it really gave me the feeling that anything was possible,” she says now. “I was all in. Which is maybe why I was invited to teach with The Actor’s Ensemble at The Lir Academy in Dublin. That was a real turning point…”

And it was here that the seeds were sown for what would become The Circle Studio, Imogen bringing all her enthusiasm and experience to town with acting classes in both Bray and Greystones, for both adults and teenagers. And soon, the young soul rebels.

“Being creative is an all-ages profession, of course,” she smiles, “so we’re also working on encouraging young playwrights with The Playground, where kids between 8 and 11 write a short play, and then we get professional actors to perform it. There’s also a plan to bring a group of 6-year-olds together with residents in a care home, to see what sort of ideas they can come up with together…”

That Imogen has a thriving acting career to look after too – including this week’s latest wry diddley-aye feature from Edward Burns, The Fearsome Foursome – means that this is a world that this all-rounder is deeply involved in. And, it would appear, deeply in love with.

As that sweltering sun tries to feck with my beautiful bald head, we talk about that love at first stage right, the communal joy of the acting class, and how collaborating on an original piece of work is one of life’s sweetest rewards…

You can find out more about The Circle Studio here, follow on Instagram here or Facebook here, and get in touch on email here.