is the founder and Artistic Director of the Súgán Theatre Company and has directed most of its productions over the past fifteen years, including the Elliot Norton award-winning productions of The Sanctuary Lamp (2005) and St Nicholas (2000). She is also a two-time winner (2001, 2002) of the Elliot Norton Award for Outstanding Director for The Lonesome West, Bailegangaire and This Lime Tree Bower. She most recently directed Heather Raffo's 9 Parts of Desire for the Lyric Stage Company of Boston and Robin Soans' Talking to Terrorists for the Súgán Theatre. As an actress, Carmel was last seen onstage in Marie Jones' Women on the Verge of HRT at Andrews Lane Theatre in Dublin. She received the 2004 Eire Society Gold Medal for her contributions to Irish arts and culture.

When Carmel O'Reilly descends the staircase to meet me in the lobby of the Loeb Theater, she seems comfortingly unlike the stereotypical image of a world-famous director. O'Reilly, wearing warm-looking corduroys and provoking little intimidation at 5'3", smiles gently as she bids the receptionist hello. After a moment, she looks at me. We introduce ourselves, and she arches her eyebrows expectantly—"Where are you taking me?" Her Irish brogue adds a certain cheer to the inquiry. "Wherever you want to be."

"So, I'm the boss, here?" O'Reilly seems surprised.

But as modest as her demeanor may be, her recent accomplishments most certainly are not. Founder and former Artistic Director of the Súgán Theatre Company of Ireland, O'Reilly joins a legacy of other theatrical greats as she takes up in Cambridge for Harvard's Visiting Directors Program (VDP). Before coming here for the VDP, O'Reilly won Elliot Norton Awards for The Sanctuary Lamp (2005) and St. Nicholas (2000). She was also a two-time winner of the Elliot Norton Award for Outstanding Director and has appeared in several noteworthy productions as an actor. The VDP brings her into an experience unlike any other she's ever had, working with a team of college students to put up a production that's as close to professional as it can be.

So, how did you become involved with the Visiting Directors Program?

Well, someone called me late last spring—I believe it was Tatiana Wilson, the president of the board—who'd sent an email earlier in the week. She asked, "Would I be interested in working with Harvard students?" It sounded fascinating, fresh, new, invigorating, challenging. When you just keep on doing what you do every day, it becomes mechanical—not that I think my regular productions are mechanical (laughs)—but you know, the dictates of the profession wear on you—you yearn for something else.

Something like..?

Just a different space, a different perspective. I was on hiatus at the time from my theatre corporation, and this seemed like a wonderful thing for me to do with the break. I thought, "Harvard students are obviously bright...the talent is there?t should be a nice challenge." So, I met the board, I came to the Loeb, was interviewed, and that was that.

Now, why Metamorphoses?

Well, once I got the job, the group and I talked about plays, looked at the recent canon. We were going for something that would offer opportunities for creativity in design and acting. There are so many plays that are hard for young people—they're just beyond their years, especially when someone young has to play someone very, very old. Not that it can't be done, but it changes everything.

Metamorphoses came to mind because it had exactly ten roles, which was a number that worked with our budget nicely. And there are five men and five women, each with substantial roles, enough to keep the level of interest strong. Sometimes, you have a play where most of the roles are walk-ons, and the actors just aren't invested in the same way.

Okay, so the centerpiece of your set is an enormous swimming pool...

Yes. The pool was featured in the original production of Metamorphoses as a metaphor for the agency of Ovid's plays. Some other shows have used water like that without going as far as we have—I believe in some other productions [of Metamorphoses], people have gone with a less imposing size for the pool. This one is kind of scary (laughs). We've had to work the entire play around it.

How so?

Well, just the notion of the pool was a huge challenge for our set designer. The team was committed to going the distance, though, to going for the full-sized pool. It was a real challenge putting it into this particular space. Courtney [Thompson, set designer] had to address all sorts of concepts, but she dealt with it in a very original way; she came in with a different angle. In most productions, the pool is square, but Courtney decided to go with something oblong. She had a very strong view of the space. When you're doing something like this, it's not only about integrating the crucial and anecdotal elements of the play, but also about making them work with your location. You've got to pull it all together.

The pool was also a huge challenge sound-wise—it was tough to get the actors to project their voices from the water. We actually considered using a recording of the sound from the original production, but I'm so glad we didn't have to do that. Roy [Kimmey, sound designer] was really a genius with figuring out a way around it.

Sounds like it was a team effort.

Yes, it was one of those projects that called on all the skills of the community—we really pulled together in a collaborative way. It was a difficult show because there was just so much to juggle: so many people involved, such a demanding set, building on a very demanding stage in such a huge space. Then, with all the challenges of the sound and the pool itself...(sighs). But it was good fun, I think. I'm amazed at how Harvard students work. (laughs) You're all doing a gazillion things.

Well, we do have a reputation to uphold (laughs). So, what was it like working with these multi-tasking Harvard students instead of professionals?

Oh, it's very different. Professional actors are available almost any time, day or night. When you're doing that kind of production, people are committed by contract to show up whenever the director wants, but when you work with students, they have classes, essays and papers, exams...and all that on top of other activities. That's one aspect that's tough; it's hard to do rehearsals in one piece, to keep it cohesive. And in Metamorphoses, all the actors are in all the scenes, so rehearsals have been almost impossible to schedule.

In general, the commitment level of professionals comes from a different place: this is their job. Having said that, what's refreshing about working with students is that they're not professional—they have much more of an intuitive response to the work. It's not too cultivated or learned—they really work with the piece at hand and are not just taking the easy way out.

And working on a non-professional set?

Again, there's a certain regimentation that comes from working with professionals. Things move around a lot here, and that's been tough. But, as Peter Brooks said, "Any space is a theater," and on occasion, we've had to move. In professional rehearsals, stage things are more nailed down. This production required a lot of physical labor—hauling pieces of the set up and down from the basement every night. We always felt the pressure of having to move everything as soon as we were done.

Here's a question: have you been having fun?

Oh, yeah, certainly. There have been so many great moments?et me think. Well, this is a play all about metamorphosis and transformation, obviously, and when the actors find themselves transforming into trees and whatnot, the script can take you to some amusing places. Rehearsals can be intense, and sometimes something has to give. There have been moments when we've all collapsed in laughter, and I've been the one who's had to draw the line—even though I was cracking up myself, what with people sprouting leaves and shoots and vines and things onstage.

This show offered such an incredible opportunity for ensemble work, and that just gets us going. Working with the water, the first day was just hilarious. You're sitting there in this enormous pool, and you just have to succumb. You give in because it's funny—gentleman actors in flowered bathing suits lopping around in a great pool of water. There's water flying everywhere—that certainly sent us into gales of laughter. And, of course, there are those lines that, whenever we say them, there are smiles if not hoots of laughter.

Why should we come see the show?

This is quite a magical piece: sometimes it's incredibly dark, there are some taboo moments, and there are moments at which you become one with everyone else in the room. At one point, for example, one of the characters says, "Do you remember the smell of apples?" When we first nailed that one in the rehearsal space, you had a sense that everyone reacted in some deep part of themselves, not to the same memory, but to a linking nostalgia of who we once were, the idea that we're all inextricably bound together. It was really an ineffable moment. I think people who come to this play will experience something personally and collectively.