Muireann O'Keeffe
As part of my major project, I reimagined Bertolt Brecht’s play The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui as a film adaptation.
I designed two key locations: Arturo Ui’s penthouse suite and Giavola’s flower shop. Arturo’s penthouse functions as both a luxury hotel suite and a self-made fortress, reflecting his obsession with status, control, and power. I developed the space with a garish “new money” aesthetic, using excessive decoration and vulgar opulence to communicate Arturo’s insecurity.
In contrast, Giavola’s flower shop operates as a front for criminal activity. I designed the space to feel more subdued, creating an atmosphere of secrecy and moral corruption.
This was a collaborative project with third year TV students to design and build four sets that could be modified to suit four separate scripts, I worked alongside three other production design students – Alice Jolyet-Cunningham, Laura Maleady and Faye Langan - to develop spaces that could facilitate a wide range of stories as the scripts were being composed.
We designed the bar, Rouge as the main setting for these stories - an underground speakeasy frequented by artists and criminals alike. Along with this, we also designed an exterior alleyway, the bathrooms of the bar and a bedroom.
As the production designer for this graduate film, I was responsible for developing the visual world of a ghost story set in 1800s Ireland. Working closely with the director, Keita Prokopcenko, and other heads of department, I collaborated throughout the planning process to ensure the design reflected the tone, atmosphere, and historical setting of the film.
My role involved location scouting, set design, prop making, and set dressing, all aimed at bringing the director’s vision to life. I focused on creating an immersive and authentic environment that captured the eerie, unsettling atmosphere of the story while remaining grounded in the period setting.
This thesis examines the character trope of the rural male outsider in contemporary Irish cinema since the late 1990’s to the present day. The rural male outsider is a staple character in Irish cinema, but is it a tired trope that we have outgrown? Why are we still concerned with this character trope in contemporary cinema? This character is rooted in a more traditional Ireland; does it have a space in contemporary cinema or should we leave it in the past?
Muireann O’Keeffe is an emerging production designer and recent graduate of the BA Design for Film (Production Design), based between Dublin and the Midlands. Over the past four years, she has developed a strong visual and technical practice through storytelling, technical drafting, digital modelling, and hands-on construction.
Muireann has collaborated on a variety of film and television projects with Film and TV students, gaining experience in concept development, set design, model making, sourcing, and on-set construction.
She aims to create visually engaging spaces that feel grounded, expressive, and emotionally connected to story.
