They’re Only Stories…
“There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.” Maya Angelou.
My name is Emily Gillmor Murphy and together with my friend and co-host Ciaran Gallagher we have created a new anthology drama podcast titled ‘They’re Only Stories…’. Why, you may ask, have we decided to do this? There are already so many great stories, why do we need more? The answer is simple, as long as there are people who want to tell stories, there will be people who want to listen. Each week we will release a new original audio drama followed by an interview with the writer, discussing the inspiration behind their story.
As a writer myself I have been bursting full of stories that I had to tell since I was a child. It began with the birds in my garden, the only creatures nearby willing to listen to my rambles. It then progressed to my family, friends and eventually to book publishers and theatre producers, who seemed just as mad as me. To me, the need to tell stories is just as strong as the need to breathe.
As a director and a designer, I’ve always seen Ciaran as a facilitator to storytelling. It’s the experience of the story that is important to him, how it looks, how it sounds, how it makes you feel, those are the things that have always mattered to him. He takes a story and makes it better.
Our first season features six different writers of various different literary experience. Some work professionally in the Arts and others just see writing as a creative hobby. Some of the writers we know as friends, while others simply answered a callout (a process that we want to do more of in future seasons). But what they do share is passion and that’s something we wanted to celebrate. Our writers in Season 1 include Hillary Dzminski, SarahKate Fenelon, Liam Galgey, Peter Dunne, Melissa Magee and Stewart Roche.
There was only one stipulation that we gave our writers for their stories: they must be themed around horror. Because who doesn’t love horror? Personally, I’ve been a spook fanatic my whole life. The dark side of people fascinates me and scary stories is a fun way to celebrate that. But to say our writers embraced this theme would be an understatement, they absorbed it and consumed it and then produced terrifying stories of mystery and intrigue that just had to be shared.
As They’re Only Stories… progresses so will our themes, it won’t always be horror and it won’t always be the same writers. But what will be the same are the people bursting inside to tell their stories, and we will be here to make sure they’re out there for you to hear.
They’re Only Stories… is created by Emily Gillmor Murphy and Ciaran Gallagher. It is part of the Headstuff Podcast Network and is supported and funded by the Arts Council Ireland.
To keep up to date with They’re Only Stories… follow us at RyotsProductions on Facebook and @ryotsproductions on Instagram. To hear more about our work, check out our website.
