Parallel to his writing and directing, Vincent has worked extensively in community arts and educational environments, nurturing and developing the work of others.

Vincent continues to offer his unique SHORT FILM WRITING COURSE to small groups. It is extraordinarily successful and has resulted in professional productions of the work. It is ideally suited to students (of any age) who have some experience of writing in another medium, OR professional experience of film in another field of work, but who have not yet written for film. At the end of a short intensive period of a few days each participant will have written the first draft of a short film script. Follow-up development work can be done. Contact Vincent O’Connell for further information

SCREEN WRITING MASTER CLASS

Vincent gave two screen writing masterclasses recently at a Tuscany Writing Retreat. The events were held  at Settimo Cielo Retreat in the beautiful Lunigiana region of Northern Tuscany.

Teaching at retreat, photograph by Karen Hargadon-Feeney

He has worked in  schools, psychiatric hospitals, prisons and unemployed centres. He has also formally taught, for some years at London South Bank University (teaching degree modules in Writing for Performance, Writing the Visual and Introduction to Film), at Sussex University (Writing for Film), at the London Film School, and was for a time Writer in Residence at Exeter University, also running a very succesful writing group at Exeter’s TEXT Festival.   With a group of twelve adult students for the Sussex University Writing a Short Film course, several of the short films were eventually professionally produced, and the group also co-wrote a feature script which was given a professional rehearsed reading.

For a number of years Vincent worked extensively with the Brighton-based New Writing South, where he was an Artistic Associate, and with whom he staged many rehearsed readings and writing workshops, and directed the run of a multi-writer show CABARET ON A SINKING SHIP.  He has mentored a number of extremely successful writers in drama, film and television, and continues to consider this a valuable part of his work.

Whilst in York he was an Arts Council funded Writer in Schools in North Yorkshire, was Artistic Director of York Community Theatre and Community Arts Director at York Arts Centre. Over these years Vincent wrote and/or directed large scale community theatre, including Metro theatre Company’s SHEFFIELD STREET SHOW, featuring a cast of 120, York Arts Centre’s ALIEN INVASION OF YORK and York Community Theatre’s political pantomime CLEVER DICK. He also in York directed and curated EXTRA 84, a fringe theatre festival running alongside the official York Festival and Mystery Plays.