Harry Potter

Yurii Hudymenko/Юрій Гудименко, 34, hails from Zaporizhia and is a Ukrainian politician, leader of the Democratic Ax Movement, in the past he was a blogger, TV presenter, and publicist. A historian by education, Yuri became a sapper when the full-scale war began, and is serving in the 130th battalion of the Armed Forces of Ukraine’s Territorial Defense, and shares his unique perspective on the war via social media. Hudymenko was in Mariupol when it was under attack, and fought in Irpin, Bucha, and Kharkiv oblast, where he was wounded in battle and rescued by fellow soldiers. On September 6th, 2022, Yurii was awarded the Order for Courage 3rd class for personal courage in defending state sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine.

Emily Lagace is a performer, director, playwright, and researcher from Maine, USA currently completing her MPhil in Theatre and Performance at Trinity College Dublin. Emily completed her undergraduate degree at Wagner College in NYC in 2020, receiving a BA English and BA Theatre Studies. The following year, she served as one of twelve Wagner Presidential Fellows facilitating the return to theatre after the pandemic. As well as Ireland, Emily has studied vocal performance and acting in NYC, London, and Dresden, Germany. Past performance credits include A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Hermia), Steel Magnolias (M’Lynn), A Flea in Her Ear (Antoinette, Olympia) and Clue (Yvette). Emily’s current area of research focuses on early modern conceptions of the body and the subsequent physiopsychology of the body in Shakespeare’s works. Her aim with this research is to make early modern plays more accessible to academics and practitioners alike and facilitate a shift in the modern perception and language of the body. Emily would like to thank Dixon Graham for asking her to be a part of the Ukrainian Play Readings and the entire cast for opening themselves up to such vulnerable subject matter.

Dixon Graham (Director) is a theatremaker and researcher from Charleston, South Carolina (USA) currently completing her MPhil in Theatre and Performance at Trinity College Dublin. Dixon completed her undergraduate degrees at Clemson University in South Carolina in 2018, receiving a BA in Production Studies in Performing Arts with a Minor in Music and BS in Marketing. She is passionate about creating quality theatre that engages the audience on multiple levels and interdisciplinary collaboration. Her current area of research concerns staging emotionally provocative subjects and how we might anticipate, navigate, and address the potential effects of performing these subjects for both practitioners and audiences. She is a producer, director, sound and projection designer, and actor for this event, which is also a part of the practice-based portion of her current research. Following the completion of her MPhil at the end of the summer of 2023, she hopes to further research the different methods and mediums for immersive storytelling and how an audience's engagement and perception of the story may change with the different methods.