I’m always excited about productions that take Shakespeare’s work and then do something really interesting with it.

‘Lost Lear’ is described as a “moving and darkly comic remix” of ‘King Lear’, told from the point of view of Joy, a person with dementia who is living in an old memory of rehearsing Shakespeare’s play.

The piece was written by Dan Colley, working with the cast and, of course, Shakespeare’s original text. I wanted to find out more about this production and how it came together, so had a chat with Dan ahead of his show’s Edinburgh run.

CM: Can you start by telling us about the premise of ‘Lost Lear’. What happens in it and who is it about?
DC: ‘Lost Lear’ is a riff on ‘King Lear’ told from the perspective of Joy, a woman with dementia.

The audience sees her as she sees herself; a young actor who is rehearsing for the role. It gradually becomes apparent that she is actually in a home where her carers employ a technique where they actively encourage her to stay in a happy memory.

Then her son arrives. Her estranged son, whom she does not recognise. Her carers try to incorporate him into the method, casting him as Cordelia, but he resists. It breaks Joy’s delicately maintained reality. And so the reality the audience experiences breaks.

Using projection, live video, green screen and puppetry we represent her confusion as she jumps between timelines and scenes from ‘King Lear’ in ways that allow those stories to echo and reveal each other. It’s about the chaos of the storm and how that can be the only thing that makes sense.

CM: What themes are explored through the play?
DC: It’s a play about memory and identity – what it means to try and connect with someone whose world no longer matches yours. It asks what happens when our realities diverge, and how we can still live together when they do.

There’s also a thread about performance itself: what it means to “play” a role in life, whether onstage or as a carer, a son, or even as someone living with dementia.

CM: How much of Lear’s story remains?
DC: We didn’t want to retell ‘King Lear’ scene by scene. Instead, we took fragments of it – the storm, the love test, the heartbreaking reunion with Cordelia – and wove them into Joy’s world.

Lear becomes the framework for her memories and relationships. It’s as much about the echoes of the play in her mind as it is about the play itself.

CM: Where did the idea for this work come from? What made you want to create a piece like this?
DC: It started when my grandmother lived in a care home for people with dementia.

There was a corridor there made up like an old Irish street – fake shopfronts and signage – intended to comfort the residents. I found it oddly unsettling. It made me wonder about how we try to bridge the gap between our reality and someone else’s.

That curiosity led me to research dementia care practices, and eventually to the SPECAL method, which asks carers to identify an old memory and keep the person with dementia there, and has an inherently theatrical quality.

It seemed to me a play was in this.

CM: Can you tell us a bit about the creative process of making this adaptation? Where did you begin?
DC: We built the play slowly, having conversations with carers and people living with dementia and people working in advocacy, all of whom were so generous with their time.

I asked performers and designers to throw themselves into it and improvise a lot. We developed it at the Riverbank Arts Centre, where I am an artist in residence, which allowed us to see the design emerge  from early on. The rehearsal room was full of experimentation: we’d try an idea, strip it back, rebuild it again.

The process mirrored the play’s subject matter in some ways – memory looping, slipping, reforming.

CM: You mentioned your research. Did you do a lot of research regarding the dementia element?
DC: Yes. That research was fundamental. We worked closely with the Dementia Carers Campaign Network and people living with dementia in the Irish Dementia Working Group, holding workshops and conversations over more than two years.

We also spoke to members of the Contented Dementia Trust who’d cared for people using the SPECAL method. They shared their stories; the challenges, but also the unexpected humour and joy.

CM: Can you tell us a bit about the cast and creative team members?
DC: The cast is superb!. Through their improvisations and contributions, they co-created the text with me – and Billy Shakes of course!

Venetia Bowe, who plays Joy, puts in one of those miraculous performances where you kind of have to see it to believe it.

She plays all the different layers of past and present, fiction and reality with Joy’s multiple morphing identities. It’s just one of those performances!

CM: What made you want to stage this play at the Edinburgh Festival?
DC: Edinburgh is a place where audiences are looking for something out of the ordinary, they’re willing to take risks. I really hope that it can continue to be a place where artists are able to take those risks too.

Because ‘Lost Lear’ straddles different forms, a festival like Fringe feels like the right home for it. And there’s the reach: the chance for the piece to connect with international audiences, including people who might not otherwise encounter it.

CM: What do you love about the Festival? What makes you want to return to it?
DC: There’s an electricity in the air at Edinburgh. The city feels like it’s breathing theatre in August.

I love the sense of discovery – you never know what’s going to stay with you, what odd little show in a basement might crack your heart open. It’s exhausting, but exhilarating.

CM: Do you go to see other people’s shows at the Festival? Is there anything you have your eye on for this year?
DC: Absolutely – it’s one of the joys of being there. I always keep an eye out for puppetry, for devised work, for anything that plays with form. I love the weird unfunny comedy and outrageous cabaret.

I always look to see what Aurora Nova is bringing. I also think – and OK I’m biased – that the Culture Ireland programme is really strong this year. ‘BITCH’ by Marty Breen is going to be a mega hit – I’m calling it now!

CM: Can you tell us a bit about yourself now? What drew you to a career in the arts and how did it all begin?
DC: Oh I’m a theatre kid. I’ve been doing it since I was nine, when I was cast as the boy in ‘Waiting For Godot’ by Samual Beckett, and I’ve basically been trying to get back to the dizzying highs of that ever since. Maybe this will be the year.

CM: What aims and ambitions do you have for the future?
DC: I want to keep making work that sits in the spaces between things; between art forms, between realities, between people. I also think I’d love to make a video game.

Sam Barlow’s ‘Her Story’ I think showed how the forms of drama and interactive media can marry so beautifully and in a way that seems so effortless – but of course, it takes a lot of work to make something like that look effortless.

So if anyone reading this knows how to do that, would they let me know?

CM: What’s coming up next for you after this?
DC: Well, ‘Lost Lear’ will tour further afield after Edinburgh, we’ll be going back to the USA later in the year – watch this space!

My other show, ‘A Very Old Man With Enormous Wings’, is in the Sydney Opera House and Canberra Theatre Centre in August as well.

Then we’re premiering a new piece called ‘The Maker’ at the Dublin Theatre Festival in October – it’s a wordless clown duet about status, power, real magic and theatrical artifice.

‘Lost Lear’ was performed at Traverse Theatre at Edinburgh Festival 2025.

LINKS: dancolley.com | instagram.com/dangcolley

Photo: Ste Murray