Review Fix chats with Reilly O’Shaughnessy discusses her new production, Belly.
About Reilly O’Shaughnessy:
REILLY O’SHAUGHNESSY (Playwright) is an actor, writer, and coach with fourteen years of experience in the performing arts. She has earned a BFA in Drama and Religious Studies from NYU Tisch, an MA in International Theater Practice and Performance from Rose Bruford, and most of an MFA in Acting from DePaul. Along the way, Reilly has had the pleasure of teaching theater and creative self-nurturing at Montessori Preschools in NYC, on Riker’s Island, and for Northwestern University’s Cherubs Program. Through it all, she has learned the power of creativity to heal and connect. Her own journeys of healing from Giant Cell Tumor of the Bone and a long-standing Eating Disorder have shaped the way she approaches everything she does—with body sovereignty, radical compassion, and shame-free creative flow.
About the Production:
BELLY is a one-person play about womanhood across three generations of, eating, grief, and control. Told through an interwoven stories of three women across one family: Ellie, a high-school swimmer groomed into an eating disorder by a well-meaning, yet incredibly harmful coach; Katie, her pregnant aunt, who is trying to “do everything right” for her baby inside of wellness culture and medical fatphobia; and Susan, Katie’s mother, newly widowed and learning how to live with grief and appetite in an empty house. Performed by a single actor, the show’s writer, Reilly O’Shaughnessy, the piece moves between sharp, funny, conversational monologues and scenes and more heightened, poetic sequences.
Review Fix: What inspired this production?
Reilly O’Shaughnessy: In 2021, I broke my leg and found out I had a rare bone tumor. It was in my femur, tucked up high into the hip socket, where it had been quietly growing for some time. I had surgery followed by months of pain followed by another surgery. I was on crutches for almost three years.
And for the first time in my life, I couldn’t use any of my old control-and-manage strategies. No sneaking to the bathroom to get rid of breakfast. No overexercising. No skipping meals under the guise of being “too busy.”
My eating disorder, which had always been adaptive and shape-shifting, lost its entire vocabulary almost overnight.
So I started eating and then I started writing.
Review Fix: Who is the unsung hero of this production?
O’Shaughnessy: My director Juliet. I have long longed for the Abbi/Ilana, Amy/Tina powerful artist gal dynamic, and in a thrilling twist, I feel so excited to have found a version of it working on this show with Juliet. She was a cheerleader, dramaturg, director, confidant, frame-maker, and a champion of this show from the jump and it has only deepened over time. I could not be more grateful or excited to keep working with such a talented powerhouse of a woman.
Review Fix: What was it like in rehearsal?
O’Shaughnessy: We were trying to fit rehearsals in between busy, busy days and living 90 minutes away from each other (45 minutes at 11pm, 120 minutes at 4pm) and so we mostly worked in Juliet’s living room which has the same dimensions of our stage at the Edinburgh Fringe! We’d eat together at almost every rehearsal (dinner or breakfast or whenever we were working) and then we’d move seamlessly between yapping and rehearsing for the duration of our allotted time. Meaningful, connective stuff, and I daresay the play is better for it.
Review Fix: How is it different from your other work?
O’Shaughnessy: I have to keep reminding myself that it’s all of our first times doing almost any of this. Despite the fact that my team and I are all seasoned arts students and actors, I’ve never written and performed a solo show, Juliet’s never directed one, Charlie’s never produced one, Sarah and Hadley have never marketed one! We’re really all navigating this with a lot of love and grace for each other as we continue to plod along as best as we know how.
Review Fix: Who do you think will enjoy it the most?
O’Shaughnessy: Women of all generations who have hated their bodies.
Review Fix: Why do you think it matters today?
O’Shaughnessy: Conversations about body autonomy, medical bias, and wellness culture are everywhere, but the lived experience of disordered eating, grief, and survival is still flattened, stigmatized, or ignored.
My Belly refuses that flattening, and I would love to invite you and yours to do the same.
Review Fix: What’s next?
O’Shaughnessy: Thrillingly, the Edinburgh Fringe! We’re so excited to be bringing this show to the most wonderful place in the world.
Review Fix: Where can people find out more?
O’Shaughnessy: Follow me on instagram @get_reilled_up
Tickets for NYC and EDI are here:
https://www.59e59.org/shows/show-detail/e2e-belly
https://www.edfringe.com/tickets/whats-on/belly
Review Fix: Anything else you’d like to add?
O’Shaughnessy: Just that I am so grateful for your sharing about this play.
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