Dean Conway is heading to the Galway Film Fleadh with the world premiere of his debut feature, Conversations In Bed, billed as the first fully improvised feature to come out of Northern Ireland.
The micro-budget film follows two contrasting relationships of the same young man at formative points of his life, and stars Jonny Grogan, Skye McClenaghan and Grace McMahon.
“My ambition in terms of what I want to achieve with filmmaking is total realism, very inspired by the likes of Andrea Arnold, Shane Meadows, Ken Loach,” he explains.
Conway filmed Conversations In Bed across five non-consecutive days in the summer of 2024 and early 2025, using his own home in Lurgan, County Armagh, and a student house in Queen’s University Belfast’s student area, the Holylands, as the two shooting locations. It was then a lengthy six-month editing process.
He wrote, directed, produced and edited the self-financed project. He had rallied friends and family to drum up a budget of under £15,000, enough to pay his cast and crew for the five-day shoot.
“There was never any motivation or attempt to pitch it traditionally to production companies or funding bodies,” he says. “This felt like completely uncharted territory, especially within Northern Ireland. I knew I always wanted to do it this way.”
The only comparable reference for an improvised feature was Kirsten Sheridan’s 2012 Republic of Ireland thriller Dollhouse.
While there was no script, Conway had crafted an overarching narrative as a treatment, as well as what he calls a “bible” for each of the characters.
“It was important for them to learn every single thing about their characters, from how their mum and dad met, how much money they have in their bank account, their deepest insecurities, what they want to achieve in life, how many people they live with, whether there was mould on their walls when they moved in.”
Despite the tight budget, Conway was determined to have an intimacy coordinator on set, using Dublin-based Sinead Cassidy Holt. “It’s set in bedrooms. There are no sex scenes. The most we see in terms of traditional intimacy is them cuddling and spooning. But the fact that it takes place in an intimate environment on top of the bed, or under the covers, it was very important for me to have someone who could advise and support and make sure things were being done 100% right,” he explains.
“There are intimate things that have happened off-screen that have to be felt in the performances.”
Conway first received a taste for writing and directing on a BFI residential programme in Newcastle, England, aged 16. After leaving school, he worked as a runner and production assistant as much as he could, working on projects such as the 2021 short Reavey Brothers starring Dylan Llewellyn and the 2022 horror Mandrake, to TV programmes The One Show and This Farming Life.
Conway first encouraged his cast to improvise on his 2023 short film Double Vodka And Blackcurrant, which was backed by Northern Ireland Screen. He was impressed by what was created. “When we got to the edit stage of the project, comparing the improvised footage to the scripted footage, it was day and night for me.”
The short ended up being 50% improvisation. “I fell in love with the whole approach,” he recalls.
‘No Bother’
Conway will be taking meetings at the Fleadh’s marketplace, the Film Fair, to explore the film’s festival and distribution future. He is also bringing his next feature, No Bother, to the fair, which draws on his own experience of losing a parent. Although Conway plans for the film to be fully improvised again, he wants to step away from the producing side this time.
“Finding producers to work with is a massive ambition for me, as is the opportunity to continue working with improv, but on a bigger scale, in a film that isn’t a chamber piece, in one location.
“Instead of No Bother just being a treatment, I’m writing a film as a traditional script,” he says. “There would still be flexibility on set, but I want to do that so it’s an easier pitch, to show it to producers, and for scheduling. Because it’s multiple locations, it’s important to be able to plan it more, to have more of a traditional backbone, but used as the foundation to improvise off.”
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