Rehearsal image for The Casement Project by Fearghus Ó Conchúir, pegged to be a main event in the 1916 commemorations. Photo: Ste Murray.
Some dates for your calendar in 2016 …
Northern Irish dramatist David Ireland’s new play Cyprus Avenue is an anticipated hot ticket next year. Directed by the Royal
Court’s Vicky Featherstone, in co-production with the Abbey Theatre (Feb 16-Mar
19), this dark comedy sees Stephen Rea playing a Belfast Loyalist who believes
his granddaughter is Gerry Adams! Those who saw Everything Between Us this year know that Ireland has a smart hand
in revealing the truth behind individual prejudice.
One Dublin master takes on another as Mark O’Rowe directs
O’Casey’s tragicomedy Juno and the Paycock at the Gate (Feb
16-Apr 16) - the theatre’s first production in 30 years - with an all-star cast
including Marty Rea, Derbhle Crotty, Emmet Kirwan and Bríd Ní Neachtain, and
set design by Paul Wills (Our Few and
Evil Days). Juno also receives a
production at the Everyman Theatre (Feb 10-20), where director Ger Fitzgibbon
tests the specificity of the Dublin tenements in O’Casey’s portrayal of the
Civil War by relocating the action to Cork City.
The O’Casey rush isn’t surprising. With the sector priming
itself for the centenary of the Easter Rising in March, the most appropriate,
if blindingly obvious, is The Plough and the Stars, which receives
its third staging at the Abbey Theatre (Mar 15-Apr 23) in seven years. Those still forlorn over the missed opportunity of a co-produced O’Casey cycle with Druid, hope that director Sean Holmes will deliver the kind of bold perspective
that Plough so badly needs.
Promotional art for Cyprus Avenue by David Ireland.
If you're wanting a breather before the commemorative tidal wave
hits, Lir graduates lay siege to Project Arts Centre with Hannah Moscovitch’s East of Berlin (Jan 8-16) and new comedy The Poor Little Boy With No Arms (Jan
20-23, with a national tour), devised with Mikel Murfi and directed by Oonagh
Murphy. There’s also a new dance performance by Philip Connaughton called Whack!!
(Feb 25-27) with national dates throughout February and March. At The
New Theatre, David Greig’s adaptation of Strindberg’s saucy Creditors (Jan 26-Feb 6) is directed by Aoife Spillane Hinks for C Company, and
there’s a new one by John Morton (War of
Attrition) called Taboo (Feb 16-27), directed by Sarah
Baxter. Morton’s first play, Heart Shaped Vinyl, will run at
Kilkenny’s Cleeres Theatre (May 18-21, 25-28) as part of the Devious Theatre
Company’s 10th anniversary.
The centenary has thrown up some interesting funding
opportunities. Fearghus Ó Conchúir is to deliver The Casement Project,
interrogating the ‘national body’ through the queer figure and 1916 rebel Roger
Casement. This project will encompass a performance for stage; a day of dance
on Banna strand, where Casement arrived aboard the gunship the Aud; the making
of a short dance-film; and academic symposia in Dublin and London. Also on
commemorative commission, ANU Productions and CoisCéim Dance Theatre will
produce These Rooms, a live performance and video installation based on
events surrounding the death of 15 civilian men on North King’s Street, Dublin
in April 1916.
In partnership with An Post, Dublin Dance Festival will
present Embodied, a series of six dance solos or
‘physical proclamations’ to be performed inside the GPO. Choreographers include
Liv O’Donoghue, Jessie Keenan, Emma O’Kane and junk ensemble’s Jessica Kennedy
and Megan Kennedy, with the overall series directed by Liz Roche. An Post and
Fishamble will also present Inside the GPO, a new play by Colin
Murphy (Guaranteed!, Bailed Out!), that will run in the main
hall of the GPO during Easter week.
In theatre for young audiences, suspect a wonderful duet
between Louis Lovett and Genevieve Hulme Beaman in Theatre Lovett’s They Called Her Vivaldi, an adventure about a musical prodigy, opening at
Riverbank Arts Centre (Feb 19). Branar will tour Maloney’s Dream / Brionglóid Maloney, a new play about a Dublin hotelier in 1916 whose dreams
collide with the Rising, opening at the Town Hall Theatre (Apr 6-9).
Later in the year, look out for Invitation to a Journey, a co-production between Fishamble, CoisCéim and Crash Ensemble about the Irish architect and genius designer ignored for years: Eileen Gray. Druid will also be mounting Martin McDonagh’s The Beauty Queen of Leenane, twenty years after their Tony-winning production. And Opera Theatre Company’s production of Mozart’s opera Don Giovanni, in a new translation by Roddy Doyle, is to be a headliner at the Dublin Theatre Festival.
Later in the year, look out for Invitation to a Journey, a co-production between Fishamble, CoisCéim and Crash Ensemble about the Irish architect and genius designer ignored for years: Eileen Gray. Druid will also be mounting Martin McDonagh’s The Beauty Queen of Leenane, twenty years after their Tony-winning production. And Opera Theatre Company’s production of Mozart’s opera Don Giovanni, in a new translation by Roddy Doyle, is to be a headliner at the Dublin Theatre Festival.
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