Black Swan State Theatre Company’s upcoming world premiere of Day (After Day) In The Life Of The Useless can be a mouthful to say, or to even remember in its entirety.

When writer, actor and associate director Will O’Mahony abbreviates it to “Useless” in rehearsals and during this interview, it would be a fair bet that his newly commissioned work for the State theatre company is far from it.

Known to Perth audiences for roles in Black Swan productions The Tempest, Angels In America, Glengarry Glen Ross, Twelfth Night, and more recently August: Osage County and Never Have I Ever, O’Mahony was working with artistic director Kate Champion on Things I Know To Be True in 2023 when she asked him what he was currently writing.

“I said, ‘Well, at the moment, I’m not too sure, but all I know is it’s about a guy’s life that is just falling apart and with every scene he seems to dig himself into a deeper and deeper hole’,” 39-year-old, Shenton Park-raised O’Mahony recounts.

“We started discussing what might be giving rise to that sort of imagery or narrative. At that point I was like, ‘Well, look, I think a lot of us, but clearly maybe me, are holding a lot of anxieties about our place in the world, the rise of AI and the insecurity that comes with that’. No one knows what’s going to happen. There was just this kind of existential anxiety about what it might be to become obsolete.

“From there, I don’t want to say the commission took care of itself, but that was a very useful unintended framing for how to continue the work.

“I’m not particularly a writer who necessarily knows what he’s going to write about until I’ve written the first draft. I envy those people, perhaps, who have a grand vision and then go out and execute it. I’m mostly just fumbling in the dark, until I can sift through all the junk and hopefully extract some sort of a diamond.”

O’Mahony emerged with humorous and emotionally honest Day (After Day) In The Life Of The Useless about a guy called Pete (played by O’Mahony) who turns to artificial intelligence after his fiancee calls him “a robot” as she dumps him days before their wedding.

The chatbot tells Pete the best revenge is living well but things do not quite go to plan.

O’Mahony says the heart of the play is about a man trying to come to terms with being abandoned in that fashion, being labelled in that fashion, all whilst battling these new forces of AI.

“It’s just one pitfall after another, and a guy who cannot get any grip on his life where it’s this never-ending carousel of misfortune,” O’Mahony explains, who has a trifecta of musical theatre, acting and directing qualifications from WA Academy of Performing Arts.

“It’s great to live out all your worst nightmares. It’s quite cathartic. He holds a lot of frustration and exasperation and bewilderment, and he’s just being bamboozled at every turn.

“There are no monologues that explore his backstory or anything. We never learn his last name. He’s just Pete, and the world moves so fast and demands so much of him that there’s no time for him to actually take a moment to maybe reflect on who he is or even have the opportunity to properly introduce himself. He’s being pinballed around his life without an opportunity to breathe, just constantly trying to find his way in the world.”

O’Mahony admits the role is exhausting, in the best possible way, as the remaining actors in the cast of five take on multiple characters in a merry-go-round or revolving door of Pete’s next enemy.

“I mean ‘enemy’ makes it sound malicious, but it’s the next person that’s going to demand something of Pete that he can’t quite give them, and they pursue that kind of single-mindedly,” he shares.

“It occupies an absurd universe where the characters are really strong, hopefully vivid people that we know, but we just kind of turn up the dial on them a little bit. I’d like to think that the world shows that in a way they’re scrambling themselves, like they’re all living in this universe that no longer really accounts for the romantic view of what it is to be human.”

While O’Mahony is now focused on his role as actor with director Adam Mitchell at the helm, he concedes to it being unusual to have his fingerprints across so many creative facets of the production.

“It probably says something about my ego, but that’s OK,” he laughs.

“I think I started writing in the first place because it comes from an unfulfilled appetite in me. I write roles that I would like to play, or I hope other actors would like to play.

“Juggling so many hats is not something I would necessarily recommend all the time, or to all people, but it just so happens that that’s who I am.”

Day (After Day) In The Life Of The Useless is at Heath Ledger Theatre, August 29 to September 20. Tickets at blackswantheatre.com.au.