Film and Stage
As well as fiction, Irvine Welsh has written several stage plays, including Headstate, You'll Have Had Your Hole, and the musical Blackpool, which featured original songs by Vic Godard of the Subway Sect.
More recently he coauthored Babylon Heights with his screen writing partner Dean Cavanagh. The play premiered in San Francisco at the Exit Theatre and made its European premiere in Dublin, at The Mill Theatre Dundrum, directed by Graham Cantwell. The plot revolves around the behind-the-scenes antics of a group of Munchkins on the set of The Wizard of Oz. The production included the use of over-sized sets with actors of regular stature.
Cavanagh and Welsh have also collaborated on a number of screenplays. The Meat Trade is based on the 19th century West Port murders. Despite the historical source material, Welsh has set the story in the familiar confines of present day Edinburgh, with Burke and Hare depicted as brothers who steal human organs to meet the demands of the global transplant market.
Wedding Belles, a film made for Channel 4 that was written by Welsh and Cavanagh, aired at the end of March 2007. The film centres around the lives of four young women, who are played by Michelle Gomez, Shirley Henderson, Shauna MacDonald, and Kathleen McDermot. Wedding Belles was nominated for a Scottish BAFTA and was subsequently sold to TV channels in Canada and Europe.
Welsh has directed several short films for bands. In 2001 he directed a 15 minute film for Gene's song "Is It Over" which is taken from the album Libertine. In 2006 he directed a short film to accompany the track "Atlantic" from Keane's album Under the Iron Sea.
Welsh directed his first short dramatic film, NUTS, which he co wrote with Cavanagh. The film features Joe McKinney as a man dealing with testicular cancer in post Celtic tiger Ireland. It was released in 2007.
Welsh co-directed "The Right to liberty" a chapter of the documentary film The New Ten Commandments in 2008.
In 2009 Welsh directed the film Good Arrows (co-directed by Helen Grace). It was written by Welsh and Cavanagh. The film is about a darts player who suffers from depression which causes him to lose his skill.
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Famous quotes containing the words film and, film and/or stage:
“The obvious parallels between Star Wars and The Wizard of Oz have frequently been noted: in both there is the orphan hero who is raised on a farm by an aunt and uncle and yearns to escape to adventure. Obi-wan Kenobi resembles the Wizard; the loyal, plucky little robot R2D2 is Toto; C3PO is the Tin Man; and Chewbacca is the Cowardly Lion. Darth Vader replaces the Wicked Witch: this is a patriarchy rather than a matriarchy.”
—Andrew Gordon, U.S. educator, critic. “The Inescapable Family in American Science Fiction and Fantasy Films,” Journal of Popular Film and Television (Summer 1992)
“You should look straight at a film; that’s the only way to see one. Film is not the art of scholars but of illiterates.”
—Werner Herzog (b. 1942)
“I know that each stage is not going to last forever. I used to think that when he was little. Whenever he was in a bad stage I thought that he was going to be like that for the rest of his life and that I’d better do something to shape him up. When he was in a good state, I thought he was going to be a perfect child and I would never have to worry; he was always going to stay that way.”
—Anonymous Parent of An Eight-Year-Old. As quoted in Between Generations by Ellen Galinsky, ch. 4 (1981)