Padraic Lillis is the Guest Artistic Producing Playwright for New York Madness in February 2012.  He has been directing professionally for twenty years. He is also a produced and published playwright. Padraic is a company member of the LAByrinth Theater, an adjunct professor with the Department of Dramatic Writing at NYU, Artist-in-Residence with Alchemy Theater, an alumnus of The Drama League Director’s Project, and a lifelong Yankee fan.

Padraic offers his insights on writing a play and where inspiration comes from.

How are you drawn to material or what sparks your artistic brain?
I’m usually sparked by a feeling or issue that keeps coming up within myself. I’ve wanted to write political plays, or social issues. However, when I’m inspired to actually write, and I’m in front of the computer starting a project – it is always the personal that is what motivates me. A feeling that has been weighing on me starts to gain a context to exist outside of myself – and then I get to look at it from different sides. I think to see if there is a way to avoid it in life. And then as I explore what is needed to remove this feeling – that becomes what I’m searching for, or the characters are, as the play moves forward.