After becoming a parent, O\u2019Reilly said she lost confidence in her writing and questioned whether she should tell such personal stories.<\/p>\n
The breakthrough came when she realised she did not have to have all the answers.<\/p>\n
\u201cI realised it\u2019s okay to say, \u2018I don\u2019t know.\u2019 It\u2019s okay to say, \u2018I\u2019m really sorry,\u2019 if you\u2019ve got something wrong. That kind of set me free to write it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Encouragement from Basement Theatre\u2019s then creative director gave her the confidence to put the show on stage, where it quickly found an audience.<\/p>\n
After touring it for several years, O\u2019Reilly decided to preserve it on film.<\/p>\n
With two young children at home and acting work already taking her away for long periods, she wanted the show to continue reaching audiences without requiring her to keep touring.<\/p>\n
\u201cI wanted to make sure that it lived a life beyond what I was capable of doing on my own.\u201d<\/p>\n
Her husband, filmmaker Peter Salmon, directed the film, the pair carefully crafting a version that retained the feeling of a live performance while subtly using cinematic techniques.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe wanted you to have the sense that you\u2019re watching something live, but it has a whole bunch of little magical accents to it that couldn\u2019t have happened live.\u201d<\/p>\n
For O\u2019Reilly, comedy is the key to telling stories that might otherwise be difficult to hear.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you laugh together about an idea, the idea gets deeper into your heart,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cMost of the time, people\u2019s first instinct is to refute whatever you say, but if you laugh together about it, then you receive it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Years of performing live have also changed the way she thinks about audiences.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople laugh because they understand,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a way of communicating that they recognise something.\u201d<\/p>\n
While the show contains plenty of laughs, O\u2019Reilly admitted some moments still catch her off guard emotionally, particularly when reading from the diaries she kept as a 12 and 13-year-old.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe more I was reading some of those heavier entries, the more it just hit home that that is just me, little 12-year-old me. I just wanted to hug her.\u201d<\/p>\n
She hopes audiences leave the cinema having shared more than just a laugh.<\/p>\n
By finding humour in the universal experiences of growing up, parenting and living in imperfect bodies, O\u2019Reilly said people become more open to seeing themselves and each other with greater compassion.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you laugh together about an idea, the idea gets deeper into your heart.\u201d<\/p>\n
O\u2019Reilly is also looking forward to returning to Hamilton, one of her favourite places to perform.<\/p>\n
\u201cHamilton crowds laughed at everything because they understood everything,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI feel like you guys all live together in a certain way that you just understand humans.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Hamilton Q&A with Morgana O\u2019Reilly about her show Stories About My Body will take place at Lido Cinema on July 19 at 6.30pm. Tickets are availble online at lidohamilton.com\/movie\/stories-about-my-body.<\/p>\n
Tom Eley is a multimedia journalist at the Waikato Herald. Before he joined the Hamilton-based team, he worked for the Weekend Sun and Sunlive. He previously worked as a journalist at Black Press Media in Canada and won a fellowship with the Vancouver Sun.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"After becoming a parent, O\u2019Reilly said she lost confidence in her writing and questioned whether she should tell…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":527975,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[1443,3376,7800,6757,156,8456,71,6288,260836,7799,23736,149384,3025,4977,111,139,69,115708,2730,205,6182,61,16550,15146,1965,80],"class_list":["post-527974","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-about","tag-actor","tag-body","tag-bringing","tag-entertainment","tag-fresh","tag-from","tag-hamilton","tag-hbos","tag-heads","tag-lotus","tag-morgana","tag-most","tag-my","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-oreilly","tag-personal","tag-role","tag-stories","tag-to","tag-white","tag-works","tag-writer","tag-zealand"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/527974","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=527974"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/527974\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/527975"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=527974"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=527974"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=527974"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}