The Pearse Centre,
Dublin
Nov 21-Dec 2
My review of The Applicant and Voices
in The Rubble coming up just as soon as I make a poodle …
At a panel discussion at Galway Arts Festival this year,
Michael D. Higgins observed that plays by Bertolt Brecht were never popular in
Ireland. It’s interesting to think about why this was the case, especially when
his absurdist contemporaries Becket and Pinter were commonly produced. It prompts
one to question what kind of home there has been in Ireland for the ‘Theatre of
the Absurd’, that is, a school of performance that sought sense in the
senseless, the inadequacy of rationality in a human condition that is
ultimately at mercy to invisible forces outside their control.
Sheer Tantrum’s Vincent O’Reilly has found a suspect that fits
the absurist M.O., the invisible string-puller: the powerful influence of
capitalist auhority. In The Applicant he
puts job hopeful Ian through an unorthodox interview process complicated by a sexual
temptress/employer (Nichola MacEvilly) and a balloon animal-wielding mute (Simon
Toal) also competing for the position. If only Ian had
some indication as to what the job entails.
Whatever service Fern, Table, Tree and Bush Inc. provide, we
can assume the labour doesn’t merit the pay grade, giving a polite but political
nod to the bloated bonuses of bank managers and other industrial/financial
giants who receive overpay. O’Reilly presents a relatable figure here, dole dry
and desperate for an income, played humbly by Patrick O’Donnell. Duncan Lacroix
comically jukeboxes sound effects from behind the audience, and his menacing
presence as “Management” edges the piece towards darker territory and sharper critique(*).
(*) ‘The Applicant’ brings
about the same agressive capitalism theme that was prominent this week in ‘Big Maggie’, specifically in how it also depicts the destruction of human relations
in the prioritision of economic capital.
As intrinsic as the economic and the familial are in the foundations
of our society, fitting it is then that Darren Donohue locates his drama in the home in Voices in The Rubble.
When Tony (David Thompson) comes home to his wife Avril (Amy Dunne) with news
of losing his job and a candid description of having sex with the secretary,
she requests for more sensitivity on his part. This is rich, considering the
dead body Avril has hung up in the fridge and her complete inability to
remember who he was and why she killed him.
Donohue’s writing takes fantastic leaps in irrationality.
With a pace so frantic and quick, the inadequacy of logic is dragged through
the dust and the effect is deleriously entertaining. Snappy deliveries by
Thompson, Dunne, and John Morton (inroduced as a wild-eyed adorer of Avril) spin
and spin this narrative of domestic stillness until it turns on its head, becoming
some time-slipped romanticisation of how one chooses to remember their lover.
The most bizarre consequence of this is that Morton’s character undergoes some
kind of reverse Oedipal complex. The highlight though is a monologue by Dunne, an
unexpected and beautiful avenue down a marital sadness where she describes her
fear of her house crumbling to the ground. The moment is a touching portrait of
the vulnerability of one investing their life into their commitment to another’s.
It’s arguable that both components of Sheer Tantrum’s double-bill
chase a Beckettian ‘stilness’ (though perhaps Bob Dylan is more of an influence
for O’Reilly, who makes literal use of the words of All Along the Watchtower). These works are contrived but that does
not mean they are devoid of tangible substance. These realities are incredibly
real, and these two playwrights appear to be enjoying not just dismantling them
but also their presentation on the stage.
What did everybody else think?
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