tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-84462489297787182402024-02-26T04:05:24.494-08:00Musings In IntermissionsA blog about theatre.Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.comBlogger491125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-31242931961292457322021-04-16T13:46:00.000-07:002021-04-16T13:46:00.952-07:00City review: A gentle epic more urbane than urban<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiH2i3HVtHEZcp47CTvyi8DSyNpRTMeWARHR182_waqOuFVbm5CLZ84QbpTyRpw_Fu1j2CRyxTsdPnEOozKO-y5zIUmO3WnV-1x9o1c0HEI50SzYdSPH_I08xPdB-yAb2ZJlmyZBQ3vjN5g/s2048/DK15032021+Everyman+050+%25282%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1365" data-original-width="2048" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiH2i3HVtHEZcp47CTvyi8DSyNpRTMeWARHR182_waqOuFVbm5CLZ84QbpTyRpw_Fu1j2CRyxTsdPnEOozKO-y5zIUmO3WnV-1x9o1c0HEI50SzYdSPH_I08xPdB-yAb2ZJlmyZBQ3vjN5g/w400-h266/DK15032021+Everyman+050+%25282%2529.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999;">In this solo play, an actor plays a city, turning its attention to its past and current inhabitants.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span><a name='more'></a></span><span style="color: #999999;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">★ ★ </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Among the gratifying things that can be said about John McCarthy’s streamed play, it turns the table on that overused cliché going back at least to Woody Allen’s description of the setting of <i>Manhattan</i>: “The city is sort of one of the characters in the film.” For some reason when production lingers moodily on scenery, it can be counterfactually described as another person in the story, rather than calling the influential ambience of design what it truly is. </span></div><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">For once, a city really is the central character. In this solo play, playing the unlikely role of a concrete settlement multiple stories high, the very flesh-and-blood McCarthy less resembles a fellow citizen than someone otherworldly. “Hello to the human people,” he says, as if landed from another planet. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Such futuristic quirks won’t come as a surprise to McCarthy’s fans. His last deed for the now-defunct theatre company Hammergrin was the podcast series <i>In Darkness Vast</i>, a trippy science fiction drama. Wild conceits are usually followed up with admirable earnestness. In <i>City</i>, his narration speeds through streets while taking in vivid impressionistic glimpses, tracing the miraculous detail of buildings and infrastructure, awing at thrilling shafts of sunlight. He lays eyes on such achievements with fresh discovery, as if seeing them for the first time. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Architecture can be beautifully attractive but it also needs to be functional. When the city’s attention turns to its current and past inhabitants, it exhibits three stories that are very different and intriguing, but their selection seems puzzlingly random. In the first episode, McCarthy transforms into a bluff American stuntman whose dangerous feat draws the attention of pushy journalists. Director Niall Cleary’s streamed production, mostly keeping to angles that allow for McCarthy’s neat physicality, reveals a close shot to underscore some Chicagoan newsroom yammering that wouldn’t be out of place in <i>His Girl Friday</i>. It certainly isn’t boring. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">The concept gradually becomes foggier as it swerves into mythology, to the battlefield where Ferdia trades apocalyptic blows with Cuchulainn. Against cataclysmic signs of the world falling apart around them, McCarthy plays both as still and laconic, allowing a silent brotherly affection to float between them. In fact, as careful vocal effects and mimicries become so exact as to melt effortlessly into Fiona Shiel’s absorbing sound design, the play often seems more lyrical than corporeal. The narration floats high above the city and wishes to see it “resolved into sound sheets.” Contemplating a sonic universe, is McCarthy still writing for podcast?</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">A sombre final story, centred on a worried mother caught in a desperate medical emergency, doesn’t make the circuit complete. Emotions on street level don’t swell into anything catching. McCarthy gives a pleasant-sounding performance like a speaker in an epic poem, gently recounting the details of a grand place, but it’s a city more urbane than urban. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><i>Streaming until 25th April.</i></span></div><div><br /></div></div>Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-1075783454918746052021-01-31T08:05:00.000-08:002021-01-31T08:05:20.103-08:00Happy Days review: A magnificent brutal revival of Samuel Beckett’s wasteland marriage play <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYwoiwbUIEzLA9U6t2uHvF-0EoY3gvuMShyphenhyphenKGUTSAZjxtFAkIdOghzzSE9GZWrgI39s8-yv_P1R-Bl5948ebh4YKdswpE0nj36Kyd8OGVPwXwDMP5-bJ1PEwVHx04vBA48N_rKGbOjnIqO/s2048/Happy+Days+by+Samuel+Beckett+Presented+by+Olympia+Theatre+and+Landmark+Productions+photo+Patrick+Redmond.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1365" data-original-width="2048" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYwoiwbUIEzLA9U6t2uHvF-0EoY3gvuMShyphenhyphenKGUTSAZjxtFAkIdOghzzSE9GZWrgI39s8-yv_P1R-Bl5948ebh4YKdswpE0nj36Kyd8OGVPwXwDMP5-bJ1PEwVHx04vBA48N_rKGbOjnIqO/w400-h266/Happy+Days+by+Samuel+Beckett+Presented+by+Olympia+Theatre+and+Landmark+Productions+photo+Patrick+Redmond.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999;">Samuel Beckett's absurdist classic buries a woman up to her waist in earth but rarely does its come across as a bitter marriage war. Photo: Patrick Redmond</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span><a name='more'></a></span></div><br /><div><b><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">★ ★ ★ ★ ★</span></b></div><div><b><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></b><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">“Is it not so, Willie, that even words fail, at times?” asks Winnie, a woman looking for reassurance from her laconic husband. Despite being trapped in the sandy wasteland of Samuel Beckett’s absurdist classic where she is buried to her waist in earth, Winnie is positively chatty, alive to the danger of becoming as silent and desolate as her surroundings. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">This hopefulness has given <i>Happy Days</i> a reputation as one of Beckett’s more upbeat plays, an optimism that previous revivals ran with. A virtuosic Fiona Shaw shed the obvious nods to an imprisoned housewife, refashioning Winnie as extravagant and well-rehearsed, as if she spent more time delivering high-flown one-liners at the Algonquin than being at home. In the play’s vast dark wilderness, she can shine as a bright counterpoint. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">It is a brave undertaking to see what would happen if you dimmed that luminance. In the Olympia Theatre and Landmark’s magnificent streamed production, fresh unsettling discoveries are found in details as subtle as the sombre dune shadows thrown by Paul Keogan’s lighting. “Is it not so, Willie, that even words fail, at times?” asks Winnie. In a staging where philosophical lines are tinged with bitterness, it sounds like a reflection on the wreckage of a marriage.<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Director Caitríona McLaughlin knows well the war that has been waged. Siobhán McSweeney’s high-handed Winnie - done-up in pearls, lipstick and a fascinator - resembles someone dressed up with nowhere to go. (Like the innovation of Jamie Vartan’s set, allowing the confining earth to topple in through doorways and windows, the irony of being stuck at home is lost on absolutely no one watching). Pairing her with Willie, who is slovenly undressed, openly lascivious and, in Marty Rea’s excellent performance, nearly permanently has his back turned to her, there appears to be a gulf as wide as it is indifferent. (As someone observes at one point: “Why doesn’t he dig her out?”).</span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">That tartness gives the play’s vaudeville comedy a sharp edge. Whether it be Rea’s mute irritated gesture reaching out to have a borrowed newspaper returned, or McSweeney’s sly condescending intonation when giving bossy instruction or a hyperbolic laugh, a lifetime of pent-up frustrations feels barely repressed. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Yet, when Willie retired into his tunnel, I was struck by how Winnie’s daily ritual - where a blind rummage through her bag might return a magnifying glass to satisfy her curiosities or a lethal revolver - resembled a touching search for self-content in the loneliness. The time comes for her to hold a parasol above her head, and McSweeney beams a brave smile for several quiet moments before it crushingly starts to waver. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Little is recognisable in the despair of the production’s second half, where a disappearing Winnie gently begins to weaken and Willie returns well-dressed as a literal moustache-twirling villain. Exhausted by the time they finally confront each other face-to-face, he can mutter only half of her name. “Win,” he says, in what almost sounds like conceding defeat. In this unhappy marriage, as this brutal production devastatingly understands, there are only losers. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><i><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Streaming until 1st February.</span></i></div><div><br /></div>Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-84239286498564463282020-12-17T17:03:00.000-08:002020-12-17T17:03:11.257-08:00The Snow Queen review: A compassionate fairy tale heating up the cold-hearted <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5kUpMYIdH57VwQQ52ZGIUSEfFSmhJDxiPxEtHdMAiw1gZSJJvLGaqoGwtC4WU9ZXIIEOwiIs5ExtL4zPdT_kJap5pklhMzfsczSkzN3kQWftdc6aPkY-Xx9uGMJGfmaVahf_LedreN0BM/s510/v4wUAGhA.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="269" data-original-width="510" height="211" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5kUpMYIdH57VwQQ52ZGIUSEfFSmhJDxiPxEtHdMAiw1gZSJJvLGaqoGwtC4WU9ZXIIEOwiIs5ExtL4zPdT_kJap5pklhMzfsczSkzN3kQWftdc6aPkY-Xx9uGMJGfmaVahf_LedreN0BM/w400-h211/v4wUAGhA.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999;">BrokenCrow's audio play adaptation delivers Hans Christian Andersen's bright-coloured characters while staying devoted to a sweet but shaken childhood friendship. Photo of Deirdre Dwyer by Enrique <span style="text-align: left;">Carnicero</span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: right;"><span><a name='more'></a></span><span style="text-align: left;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>The Everyman, Cork & Garter Lane Arts Centre, Waterford</b></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">★ ★ ★ ★ </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Things are done with mirrors in <i>The Snow Queen</i>, BrokenCrow’s audio play adaptation of Hans Christian Andersen’s wild fairy tale. High in a mountain, a mysterious woman keeps an all-magical looking glass that only holds gloomy reflections, distorting all positives into negatives. It will show your attractive fireside cabin as a bleak dilapidated shack. More depressingly, it transforms an enthusiastic kid into a mean grouch. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">“You know when you see your best friend whispering with someone else, and you think maybe they’re whispering about you?” asks Gráinne, a girl watching her schoolmate grow distant. The hurt voice of young Mia Clifford weaves this sweet portrayal of a childhood friendship shaken and left delicately fragile. Since falling from a tree, Fionn Butler’s Caoimhín moodily evades questions about his health (“What is this, <i>Twenty Questions</i>?” he says) as if, in Deirdre Dwyer’s sensitive script, this were a compassionate enquiry into a good-natured boy’s worrying unhappiness. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Of course, a fragment of the Snow Queen’s mirror has gotten under Caoimhín’s skin, and when he vanishes Dwyer’s production adopts the brisk pace of an adventure story. Gráinne’s search for her friend becomes encouraged by the folky guitar of Anthony O’Dwyer’s music, while a dynamic cast (Aideen Wylde, Jacqui Kelleher and Nicholas Kavanagh) voice bright-coloured characters met along the way, from a deceiving sorceress to a hell-raising young thief. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Released as an eight-part series, the play ingeniously keeps its audience on Gráinne’s trail by posting out sealed messages, one to be opened for each episode. Whether a report about a missing boat or a payoff for a stolen carriage, the dispatches - embellished by a team of excellent illustrators - extend the rich world of Dwyer’s play. The sulphur of Andersen’s Denmark gets replaced by a magical, Irish rural world with no iPhones but where there are reindeer. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times;"><span style="font-size: large;">There are a few zingy contemporary touches to admire. Listen close and you'll hear Gráinne wash her hands when arriving inside someone’s house. The possessive sorceress is actually an old woman feeling the loneliness of isolation. There are talking flowers being magically kept alive out of season. </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: times;">The structure of Andersen’s fairy tale is such that each chapter is built loudly around eye-catching characters passing through. Impressively, Dwyer's play delivers that spectacle while staying devoted</span><span style="font-family: times;"> to the story's central relationship. At the end of the last episode I listened to, Gráinne stepped out into the blizzard looking for Caoimhín. “It is the power of her warm heart and clever head that has gotten her this far,” says a passer-by. Loyalty is a good, reversing mirror image for detachment, and it might heat up the cold-hearted.</span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><i>Runs until 18th December. </i> </span></div><div><br /></div></div>Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-43034480920746979482020-12-10T13:17:00.002-08:002020-12-10T13:27:12.838-08:00Musings in Intermissions at 10: Where is the master playwright?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigtZofL0dG55DzZb-O1smhBcIkLY0DvFIp8l58hQwuzX6ufIXzTyYHw_ZE-10L8zXwK3VpmRpOwdK7HnBpT7MKnUKD8pTFeXEv5QrUfpU37CoTzO-VbmBCY74nSK3fEcHw5rdDQpYqRyy2/s657/gurzuf.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="276" data-original-width="657" height="168" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigtZofL0dG55DzZb-O1smhBcIkLY0DvFIp8l58hQwuzX6ufIXzTyYHw_ZE-10L8zXwK3VpmRpOwdK7HnBpT7MKnUKD8pTFeXEv5QrUfpU37CoTzO-VbmBCY74nSK3fEcHw5rdDQpYqRyy2/w400-h168/gurzuf.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999;">The past 10 years have been a struggle against an anxiety over who the next number one playwright is going to be. Photo: Anton Chekhov's summerhouse in Gurzuf, Yalta</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span><a name='more'></a></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">The disappearance of theatre critics from publications has become so widespread, the job seems like something from an old era of bustling news-desks and bright marquee lights, flickering in black and white footage. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">My first glimpse came from reading a collection of Walter Kerr’s <i>New York Times</i> essays from the 1960s, assigned to me as part of a college reviewing class. I was living in a new city, making theatre-going and filing copy a weekly practice, and Kerr’s office sat foggily in my brain. One essay “Back Home” was written shortly after the 1963 New York City newspaper strike, a period when Kerr had to adjust to appearing on television panel shows. He opens his readers’ letters expecting responses to his thoughtful criticism but instead gets observations of how awkward he looked onscreen, with his shirt sleeves rolled up to the shoulder and cigarette smoke covering his face. One letter comes from his optometrist, advising he might need a new pair of glasses.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">When the newspaper strike is over, Kerr returns to his office and finds a pile of reader mail waiting for him. Unlike the previous distracted correspondences, these are the true, passionate, sometimes indignant letters from people who want to talk theatre, often opposing his stance on plays, written with love for the art. He leans back in his chair with the feeling that all is right with the world. “The words came crisp, well-typed, deeply outraged, and familiar as friendship,” he says. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">It is something of a theory in print journalism that the letters to the editor section is a construction of the public, or <i>a</i> public at least. It’s a way of that faceless readership becoming corporeal. I was fascinated by how the letters manifested Kerr’s audience, and by the invitation of his criticism to pull up a chair and speak to a worthy listener. I was no less taken aback by a pile of theatre mail than Kerr himself who, decades later in an interview with the City University of New York, still excitedly recalled the stack of letters he received after the appearance of his first ever newspaper article. He took it as a sign to pursue a career. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">The humourist Jean Kerr, Walter’s wife, wrote the superb essay collection <i>Please Don’t Eat the Daisies</i>, which in turn inspired a veiled biographical film of the same title. Watching it expanded my vision of how to be a critic in light-blinding New York, of going to cocktail parties, buying big houses, having celebrity showdowns with actors and producers, and even the oath-breaking tragedy when you allow your criticism to sour into wisecrack. It’s a shiny, ritzy film based on real events but to arts journalists working nowadays it’s a fantasy. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">I was someone who could not establish. I started off getting small commissions in respected outlets before freelancing for several publications over a few years. It’s no secret that rates of pay are morbidly low and salaries non-existent. Proving indispensible to editors and securing some regular sections is an elaborate hustle, and people succeed at it. A time came when security became my priority, so I got an office with a desk and letters but it was to do a different job. I didn’t establish as a critic but I wasn’t done with criticism either. I went back to writing on a blog because it felt like it could be anti-establishment. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Writing can give you a life-mattering dopamine release but if it compels you to sacrifice your free time and do it for little or no money, is it actually a toxin? It’s a debate that has constantly re-evaluated my self-worth, usually resolving to hold out for better success in the future. Samuel Beckett’s “Try again. Fail again. Fail better” may have become a mantra for start-up culture and can read as vacuously as a motivational poster but I was spun through its cycle and, while it sometimes emotionally wrecked me, it also gave me resilience. Why was this contradiction acceptable to me? If criticism led me to failure time and again, why did I still get a buzz from writing it? </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">For me that fitted appropriately into the dark comedy of the past 10 years, a period where things that were expected to happen really didn’t. The promise of a “recovery” after years of austerity didn’t materialise, and a lethally disrupted flow of expenditure into the theatre industry, no less than the nation, left stretches of it to decay and vanish, with complex damaging effects lingering in the long-term. Parallel to these events were reported sightings of a strange anxiety, the jitters of an industry wrangling with its own creativity, panicking on how to fill an empty space. This nervousness didn’t influence the plays that got made but it has ended up defining my decade-long argument, in the form of the reviews and features I’ve written. One unifying impulse was to grapple with invisible biases about what a good play is supposed to be, the strong inclinations of cultural ideas that were long dominant. These biases may have been dressed up as aesthetic arguments (great likings for postcolonial period dramas, 20th century rural dark-comedies, Chekovian family sagas, Jazz Age farces) but they also drew lines under whose creativity gets to be considered ambitious and what art gets to have lasting power. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">The anxiety that theatre was changing was on the edge of my peripheral vision from the beginning. It was first put to me as a statement when, as a theatre studies doctoral student in 2011, I was interviewing an experienced playwright for my research. They spoke of a confusion that had enveloped all levels of the industry, from managements to artists to audiences. “There is no master voice right now,” they said. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Nostalgia can be reassuring. (“Good times,” we say, exchanging nods). Yet, it was the name given to a clinical diagnosis for soldiers in the 17th century whose maladies were attributed to being away from home for too long. In the white light of that Dublin café in 2011, as at my work desk in 2020, there were worrying flickers of an old film projector, a troubling vision of a better time. Theatre seemed to be in a psychological struggle with its past.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">***</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">A few kilometres northeast of Yalta, the town Gurzuf overlooks a picturesque bay curtained by dramatic rock faces at each end. In 2008 Brian Friel and Thomas Kilroy travelled here to visit a summerhouse that had belonged to Anton Chekhov. It was a pilgrimage made to satisfy an artistic obsession. “I felt that perhaps in Gurzuf we did lift the veil; there certainly was a presence there,” Friel wrote to Kilroy afterwards. It was a trip marking Friel’s 80th birthday, who, having carefully woven a playwriting career that was unmistakably modern in a very intellectually European mould, is sometimes referred to as the “Irish Chekhov”.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">The white summerhouse sits above a secluded beach, a sanctuary where Chekov used to pace and write. Hanging on the walls inside are memorabilia from the Moscow Art Theatre, artefacts of Konstantin Stanislavsky’s productions and that meticulous era of Russian naturalism. It would have been difficult to picture how Friel’s emotions were stirred by the house, as he was legendarily private as an individual, but Kilroy later recounted details of the trip for an <i>Irish Times</i> article. There on the wall, protected within a picture frame, was the manuscript copy of the first page of <i>Three Sisters</i>. It was this that moved Friel the most. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">This wasn’t always the sage-like Friel. As a schoolteacher in 1950s Derry, he was enamoured by the short story section of the <i>New Yorker </i>and its milieu including Frank O’Connor, a rambunctious writer who had first been nicknamed the “Irish Chekhov”. In his short stories, O’Connor drew on fitting parallels from late Imperial Russia for his vision of post-Independence Ireland as priest-dominated, provincial, hard-drinking, in other words the stuff of great short fiction. When Friel first gained his international following in 1966 with the Broadway run of <i>Philadelphia, Here I Come!</i>, this grit was only background detail. A touching drama about a young man preparing to leave his silent father and emigrate to the U.S., it’s a play about gulfs: the longed-for connection between child and parent, a lone soul’s yearning for peers and romance, and the distance of the Atlantic Ocean threatening to sever those links forever. Its innovation is when the man’s “private” self emerges as a separate character, from the mould-green walls of his bedroom in director Hilton Edwards’s premiere production, to lash out at the oblivion of parochial small-town life and muted male emotion. The play resonated as an anxiety dream for Ireland but possibly wider afield too. Like all openings on Broadway, the fate of <i>Philadelphia, Here I Come!</i> would partly rest with Walter Kerr’s influential <i>New York Times </i>review. Helping secure its success, and in turn Friel’s international following, Kerr observed the “play’s power of openly affecting audiences - by openly I mean to unrestrained tears.”</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Bridging a gap between Ireland and America was one of Friel’s early goals. The world-building powers of the American Dream had an intoxicating hold on Irish culture, and he would go to the Promised Land like O’Connor before him. Key to his success in finding audiences in both countries was his balance beam-nimble approach to Catholic masochism, the enthusiastic and tart jabs that appealed on both sides of the Atlantic. The decades of the rosary made eyes roll, chastity-preaching relatives were made into living nightmares, and unplanned pregnancy was the end of the world. But where Friel delivered this oppressiveness with a devastating intensity in <i>Philadelphia, Here I Come!</i>, a follow-up play <i>Lovers: Winners and Losers</i>, premiered on Broadway the following year, was comparatively toothless. Showing two different couples and the problems facing their relationships, it tilts closer to Irish fetishisations for American audiences: a male scholar whose greatest joy is laying eyes on an exam paper; a religious mother standing sentry-like in the way of her forty-something son having sex. The short, fast-paced dialogue between the two teenage lovers fits the grooves of Hollywood screwball comedy, as if it had a young Jean Arthur and Cary Grant in mind rather than actors closer to home like Joan O’Hara or Donal Donnelly. Even if Friel’s wide appeal was tilting towards an exaggerated showcase of Ireland for American audiences, back home he was still an extraordinary success story. <i>Philadelphia, Here I Come!</i> augmented his connection between him and his audience, creating a remarkable following that would grow.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Friel wasn’t a pioneer for Irish playwrights on Broadway. Bernard Shaw, Paul Vincent Carroll, M.J. Molloy and Seán O’Casey (who licenced a musical version of <i>Juno and the Paycock</i>) had all been there before. None of them received as much momentum from the venture though, which Friel used to evolve his ideas into impressive new forms. It may be surprising to see him write in 1972, for the <i>Times Literary Supplement</i>, that Ireland still had the psyche of a peasant country. The state’s economic focus may have shifted from agriculture to foreign investment in the late 1950s but the transforming effects weren’t widespread. This so-called peasant psychology - defined by relationships with land ownership; agitated by a multi-generational, historical sense of restlessness and insecurity - would go on to form his most original ideas as part of a new career-defining metamorphosis. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">After the violent assaults against civil rights protestors sparked the Troubles in 1968, there was an urgent refocus in Friel’s plays. Unlike his contemporary Seamus Heaney, whose timely poems for his collection <i>Door Into the Dark</i> had been presciently written before conflict broke out, Friel didn’t have a strategy in place. Turning his attention away from America, an idea for a play about a group of protestors shockingly murdered by the British Army was given shape by the real-life events surrounding the Bogside Massacre, and premiered in London as <i>The Freedom of the City</i>. The play switches between the protestors’ final moments hiding from soldiers in a city hall building and the inquest into their deaths led by biased authorities warping the truth of what happened. It’s a very stylised play using many techniques that don’t all work; the use of a sociologist character to give lengthy explanations of working-class poverty is one of Friel’s clumsier narrative devices. This response strategy to real occurrences was deployed again in <i>Volunteers</i>, which used the furore over the Wood Quay development in Dublin as its premise. It sees a group of IRA prisoners working on an archaeological dig where the excavated artefacts reveal to them the historical conflicts that shaped their lives.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">While both <i>The Freedom of the City</i> and <i>Volunteers</i> show a searching inventiveness, neither are the best remembered of Friel’s dramas from the Troubles era. The celebrated plays are bound up in his transformation into a prestige playwright. In theatre the word “virtuoso” is used to describe an exceptional artist but its inference is showier that we think - after all, it’s a musical term from the Baroque period, a ludicrous age of unrelenting dissonances and key changes. “Virtuoso” can refer to someone of unusual abilities, who has mastered extra-mechanical elements in their art, including the import of recognisable techniques by famous artists.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">The ancient Greek tragedian Euripides was cited as the inspiration for <i>Living Quarters</i>, premiered in 1977. While there are mythological undertones to the solider returned after a long mission only to discover fateful revelations about his family, it was the lining up of the man’s children and their hopeful escape from the military town that glimpsed the playwright’s major influence going forward. It’s no coincidence that this sounds like Chekhov’s <i>Three Sisters</i>; Friel was preparing to write his own translation of it. At the same time, he was tracing the schema of <i>The Cherry Orchard</i>, a comedy about a leisured family’s waning fortune in the years before the Russian Revolution. Like Chekhov, Friel saw how a family saga can be made into something more epic, how people’s dead ends can be given the towering dimension of history, their personal loses fitting into larger axis-shifts. His next play <i>Aristocrats</i> has the attractive faded grandeur of <i>The Cherry Orchard</i>, set among Catholic gentry in a county bordering Northern Ireland. There are passing references to the Troubles but the family’s denial has to do with their own false mythology as a legendary estate, associated with court judges and famous writers; a fiction they have escaped into to avoid their secret crises. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">The first decade of Friel’s career was marked by subversive transatlantic plays but it was this reinvention in his second decade that would make him long remembered. To address shattering atrocities at home, he matured into the high-art seriousness of modern European theatre. Coinciding with this artistic shift was the establishment of his company Field Day with the actor Stephen Rea in 1980, launched urgently by Friel’s masterpiece <i>Translations</i>. A cross-section portrait of a school in a 19th century garrison town (à la <i>Three Sisters</i>), it’s an intensely romantic love story between an English cartographer and a local woman, surrounded by political violence and the sad erasure of native culture by the Ordinance Survey. It’s where parts of Friel’s importance to his audiences - the symbolism of the truth-telling earth; the far-reaching links to a previous generation’s trauma - find their most powerful expression, making it <i>the</i> history play about the colonisation of Ireland. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Audiences didn’t just think they were in good hands with Friel; they knew they were in the best hands. He was a clarifying voice in a time of upheaval. Field Day continued to make sense of The Troubles through collaborations with other reputed artists and Friel’s status as an exceptional artist grew through the enterprise by making his connection with Chekhov more explicit. His translation of <i>Three Sisters</i> kept its Russian period setting but the play’s military occupation had obvious resonances. (The playwright Lucy Caldwell would eventually transfer its drama to pre-ceasefire Belfast, in what is the best Irish version of the play since). More importantly, the script short-circuited other English-language translations to make it more organic for Irish actors to deliver. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Friel would by no means be a Chekhov imitator from that point onwards. His most original successes were actually ahead of him. The much-loved <i>Dancing at Lughnasa</i>, an aching picture of a rural past slipping away, almost immediately transferred from Dublin to London and New York. <i>Faith Healer</i>, with its deliberately glitchy monologues about a travelling miracle curist, also found commercial success to match its acclaim. However, a late phase began tellingly with another Chekhov translation, <i>Uncle Vanya</i>, for the Gate Theatre in 1998. The institution was searching for a contemporary playwright to offset its classical programming, and Friel used the opportunity to dive even deeper into Chekhov’s repertoire, even producing an oddity such as <i>Afterplay</i> - an imagined meeting between different characters from <i>Uncle Vanya</i> and <i>Three Sisters</i> veering into fan fiction. New versions of plays and short stories, along with another <i>Cherry Orchard</i>-style family saga <i>The Home Place</i>, would seal Friel’s status as tied directly to the serious plays of Chekhov. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">This wasn’t an isolated phenomenon; around the world still, contemporary playwrights make their versions of Chekhov’s plays - because they are great, but superficially it can seem a rite of passage to become an “auteur.” The consensus held that this was the real stuff, and even a requirement for default ambition in Irish theatre. It helped make Friel into someone for everybody else to be compared against, as the master playwright. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">***</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">When I began seeing plays, much of the public contempt aimed at them was coming from theatre critics themselves. In 2007 the Arts Council commissioned the <i>Sunday Independent’s</i> Emer O’Kelly, whose printed views on theatre and social issues were sometimes openly vituperative, to write a pamphlet about the value of the arts. A polemic titled “The Case for Elitism,” it was an attack against community theatre and young people’s lack of knowledge about art history. (“We are by definition lazy and selfish when we’re young,” she says). In O’Kelly’s view the Arts Council needed to narrow its conscious-raising to the Great Works, not expand it. More astonishing was when the <i>Irish Times’</i> much-respected critic Fintan O’Toole made a TV documentary called <i>Power Plays</i>, a thesis that artists ceased making political plays during the Celtic Tiger. It embodied his decades-long argument but also, sadly, its dead-end. In presenting a list of his favourite “big” national plays such as <i>Translations</i> - their prestige underlined by shots of the director Garry Hynes staging scenes in a studious rehearsal room - O’Toole revealed his bias as disappointingly traditionalist. For any new play to be considered ambitious, it would need to have the same kind of creativity as its forebears. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">This too seemed like an argument for a particular kind of play structure. It’s true the likes of <i>Translations</i> have a weightiness to them. They’re usually super-sized, running to over two hours, as if the length were required to hold their “big” topical ideas. It’s also understandable why a director would be drawn to giant complex plays. In an interview last year, Hynes explained why she wanted to direct Nancy Harris’s psychological thriller <i>The Beacon</i>. “It felt grown up. It had four or five stories running at the same time, banging off each other, but kept in balance,” she said. That’s a good definition of maturity, one measured by metrics of meticulousness and sophistication as opposed to politics. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Theatre did undergo radical reinvention but the more stock put into the idea of artists being confused about how to make great plays, the more it revealed to me where the anxiety of influence really lay. When the book critic Clive James wrote about a controversy in American literature where the Modern Language Association, an academic syndicate, reprinted an important series of American classics only to encumber them with difficult introductions and footnotes designed to enslave future PhDs, he highlighted an important distinction. “The intelligence of the academy ceased to understand its relation to the intelligence of the metropolis,” he said. That’s not to compare the Modern Language Association’s project with the inclusive and contemporary theatre books recently written by scholars in Irish colleges. Rather, the bias represented by O’Toole's documentary seemed as if it were from the academy of yesteryear, out-dated and out of touch with audiences sitting in auditoriums throughout the country. The anxiety of influence, the worry over who is going to be the next master playwright, wasn’t inflicting artists; it was inflicting fans with the strictest ideas of what good theatre is allowed to be. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">The “metropolis,” as James knew it, is where arguments about art happen on the ground. It’s where book-smart meets street-smart, opinions formed and argued outside theatre doors, in cafés and bars. Artists are of the metropolis too, soaking Palmolive-style in social movements and changing fashions. It would be unrealistic to think that art as we recognise it wouldn’t change. Instead of being able to point to a long Chekhovian drama from the past 10 years, I found myself electrified by Sonya Kelly’s magnificent comedy <i>How to Keep an Alien</i>. It didn’t tick those default boxes for greatness; it is comic, queer, female-authored and biographical. A tender story about falling in love with a woman from abroad and searching for long-distance commitment, it also gave a genius portrayal of the state’s immigration system as self-punishing and shambolic, a Kafkaesque nightmare shot through with laughing gas. It doesn’t need to be two hours long; every second of it is crystal-cut, every expositional line disguised with a flooring bon mot.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">The old academy thinking seemed to have strong feelings about aesthetics too, with fourth wall realism considered the dominant, serious form for presenting a play. It probably wouldn’t allow in Veronica Dyas’s excellent <i>My Son My Son</i>, a touching contemporary play following a tireless volunteer in central Dublin. With face-front addresses to the audience, and industrial folk accompaniment by an onstage musician, its surfaces are more exposed than polished. That’s to be expected, given it’s a version of Bertolt Brecht’s “learning play” <i>The Mother</i> and Dyas recognises its lesson that a lone individual’s best interests and those of the community are one in the same. Set over two decades, going back through the “recovery” to austerity to the Celtic Tiger, it shows a working class neighbourhood tragically ignored by wider progress, being subtly imposed on by gentrification, and its heartfelt defence by passionate activists. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">To unravel the idea of the number one playwright is to reveal that theatre is really moving in thrilling directions, and not having to stick to one course. The first living playwright to have a close association with the Gate Theatre since Friel is Nancy Harris, whose plays don’t have any Imperial Russian interiors. Harris recently wrote two ingenious psychological thrillers - a genre usually dismissed - in <i>Our New Girl</i> and <i>The Beacon</i>, both aiming suspicion at targets that felt worthwhile, riding the recent aftershocks of true-crime obsession and #MeToo. If part of Friel’s importance was his intervention into violence, through his on-the-ground playmaking during the Troubles, there was a comparable flashpoint when Louise Lowe made <i>Laundry </i>in 2011, during the height of shattering investigations into the Catholic Church’s abuses of power. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Lowe would be most likely to be pigeonholed as the master playwright right now, for the political seriousness of her plays, but she disrupts the idea’s construction at every turn. Her dual status as a director, specifically an innovator of a style of immersive theatre more intimate than the louder Punchdrunk shows, makes her an artist who doesn’t make plays for theatre buildings. The lifespans of the productions are tied to the sites they’re staged in, meaning they can’t tour or even be revived. Above all, Lowe’s influences don’t seem to come from the intellectual modern European school. Her love for the performance artist Amanda Coogan informs her plays’ fluidity, their stories taking place as if in a loop, writing historical events into patterns. The outstanding <i>The Boys of Foley Street</i> became my cipher for understanding the city where I live. Set in a 1970s Dublin gnawed by recession and penetrated by heroin, it’s a near-Dantean picture of state neglect feeding into criminality - the entangling of young men into the debt of brutal drug lords; the unsettling ionisation of male aggression into rape. Smoke from the Eden Quay bombing drifts over one unforgettable scene where a victim slides eerily down a car front-window. The safe everyday world get blasted - like Sarah Kane’s famous eponym - especially during a pummelling encounter in a flat, where the residents’ abuses come to light like poker-hot jabs, each one more searing than the last. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Plays such as these sat at an important nexus-point for me, between being compelling important while without any classical prestige. In his final book<i> Cultural Amnesia</i>, Clive James wrote about his obsession with a lone sentence written by the literary critic G.K. Chesterson: “To set a measure to praise and blame, and to support the classics against the fashions”. Read straight this is a critic’s formula for conservatism, but Chesterson was complex. A lay theologian preoccupied with reasoning, he famously wrote paradoxes as a kind of precautionary measure, to have one side consider the thinking of the other. The sentence is designed to crack open the space between “classics” and “fashions,” uncovering the obvious truth that “classics” <i>were</i> “fashions” once. Great works of art couldn’t be judged by their agreed prestige on arrival because they didn’t have any. What’s always been required has been to judge art by its interior vitality, and not to run out of appreciation at a crucial time. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Most stories have their silent twin. Long before he worked as a theatre critic, Walter Kerr taught in a Washington D.C. college where he became engaged to an Irish student named Maeve Brennan. Their mysterious break-up coincided with shock developments in Brennan’s life; she dropped out of college, left her family in Washington D.C, and moved to New York alone where she would pave an accomplished career as a journalist and short story writer. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">In the late 1960s, while Kerr was sitting inside theatres reviewing plays, Brennan was outside chronicling the transformation of Broadway from a community neighbourhood into a shabby entertainment centre. Her <i>New Yorker</i> column “The Long-winded Lady” had a beloved urbane, idiosyncratic style - steadfast and flâneur-like, the dispatches rarely get too close to other people on the street, usually only resting to sit at a restaurant window to take in the city-view. From that vantage point, Brennan could devastate when describing a bookshop that had closed or an art gallery that vanished. She gave a poignant sense of a version of the city that should be in place - a city that’s musical, arresting, transforming people’s moods - but isn’t.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">As analysis about gentrification and city-culture, Brennan’s “Long-winded Lady” columns are fascinating, but what attracted me most is their sad urbanity. Critics are of the metropolis too, and I could hear those same industrial, jangling cranes moving in as the job of theatre critic gets demolished. The columns give an odd reassurance, as if even in the middle of a demolition site you can still find somewhere to write, and if the construction dust falls prettily like snow, I will admire it for as long as I stand out in it. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><i>Like what you're reading? Buy me a coffee at <b><a href="https://ko-fi.com/chrismccormack">https://ko-fi.com/chrismccormack</a></b></i></span></div></div><p><br /></p>Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-47201051090269570002020-12-03T08:33:00.006-08:002020-12-04T06:52:29.104-08:002020: the best theatre of the year<div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj67WPuPXQv9QNkOW70HFFaVEbx-jelnAsdrpkdt-A2T9tvlKA5AMM90P181nPPUfYROcW6GUcf0a-a7IQlkJ6b3efeW4q5uZol-xHGIMtd8uaQ9sDDex6C4OyyzcUxrnk8uQIbYtlJDsxy/s1200/FotoJet+%2528blog%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1200" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj67WPuPXQv9QNkOW70HFFaVEbx-jelnAsdrpkdt-A2T9tvlKA5AMM90P181nPPUfYROcW6GUcf0a-a7IQlkJ6b3efeW4q5uZol-xHGIMtd8uaQ9sDDex6C4OyyzcUxrnk8uQIbYtlJDsxy/w400-h400/FotoJet+%2528blog%2529.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999;">My favourite theatre moments of the year: <i>Hansel and Gretel</i>, <i>Our New Girl</i>, <i>The Lieutenant of Inishmore </i>and <i>Will I See You There.</i></span></div></div><div><span><a name='more'></a></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">How do you look back on a shock to the system, one that brought many people in touch with their mortality and security? This was the question on the mind for Musings In Intermissions’ year-end “Best theatre” list. Beginning with something about survival felt appropriate, and I decided to go to the source. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">In recent years, it has been reassuring to clear up that common misunderstanding about Charles Darwin and evolutionary biology. Many think that the “survival of the fittest,” a central phrase in the theory of natural selection, is about the ruthless killing the weak. What caught Darwin’s eye was the ability to adjust, to better live in your environment. Those who adapt are the ones to survive.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Yes, productions were postponed and a season was lost but, in the strange world brought on by the pandemic, plays were still staged. These were no small miracles. This year’s list attempts to reflect some of those Darwinian changes, including the migration to streamed theatre and to live plays staged under the physical restrictions of public health advice. You will see productions from earlier in the year coming up repeatedly, which may make things seem lop-sided towards the months before the pandemic, when making plays was easier. Not enough has been said about how this was the strongest start to a theatre year in quite a while.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">I’ve embraced the opportunity to highlight some newcomers who in an ordinary year I mightn’t have spotted as easily. The numbers end up showing the funding hierarchy though. The Abbey Theatre has eight mentions, for co-productions in which the national theatre resembles more a backer than a catalyst. The runner-up is Irish National Opera with six citations. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Finally, there was no category to put Bewley’s Café Theatre who, when the future of their home seemed uncertain, almost single-handedly gave the capital a metropolitan flare again during those luminous weeks in August. </span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>BEST DIRECTOR</b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">The only one who’s been here before is Annabelle Comyn, who did a Tobe Hooper on the thriller-satire <i><a href="https://musingsinintermissions.blogspot.com/2020/03/our-new-girl-review-sexism-satire-meets.html">Our New Girl</a></i>, filling its modern setting with the spooky, light-flickering chill of Gothic supernatural horror. Andrew Flynn rebounded from last year’s bloodless <i><a href="http://musingsinintermissions.blogspot.com/2019/02/the-cripple-of-inishmaan-review-like.html">The Cripple of Inishmaan</a> </i>with a knockout, risk-taking revival of the dark comedy <i><a href="http://musingsinintermissions.blogspot.com/2020/01/the-lieutenant-of-inishmore-review.html">The Lieutenant of Inishmore</a></i>. Muireann Ahern and Louis Lovett did their best work to date with <i>Hansel and Gretel</i>, sharpening the edges of Engelbert Humperdinck's opera with references to the homelessness crisis. It felt like a whole other year by the time we got to <i><a href="http://musingsinintermissions.blogspot.com/2020/09/will-i-see-you-there-review.html">Will I See You There</a></i>, a socially distanced play-installation eavesdropping on friends who are privately struggling, but John King’s meticulous production reminded us that good theatre remains to be about the details. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>Andrew Flynn</b> - <i>The Lieutenant of Inishmore</i>, a Gaiety production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>Annabelle Comyn</b> - <i>Our New Girl</i>, a Gate Theatre production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>John King</b> - <i>Will I See You There</i>, a Murmuration production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>Muireann Ahern and Louis Lovett </b>- Hansel and Gretel, an Irish National Opera, Theatre Lovett and Abbey Theatre co-production</span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>BEST SET DESIGN</b> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFRfb-49hwLhj69S8s54g8UTvWdvDvvoPbh-WdUBPH_voFqQpw0V6PwE-x9PGQm3aH1uZXMfH-aKNgLVowq3pW37jZNxnRL2uCRhvPRHkjZsJfCPwy-RribWiJcEZcRUdvlz7gn1IgFekW/s969/To.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="583" data-original-width="969" height="241" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFRfb-49hwLhj69S8s54g8UTvWdvDvvoPbh-WdUBPH_voFqQpw0V6PwE-x9PGQm3aH1uZXMfH-aKNgLVowq3pW37jZNxnRL2uCRhvPRHkjZsJfCPwy-RribWiJcEZcRUdvlz7gn1IgFekW/w400-h241/To.png" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999;"><i>To Be a Machine (Version 1.0).</i></span></div><br /><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Jamie Vartan traded on the same romantically doomed Ruritania of Hergé’s <i>Tintin</i> and Wes Anderson’s <i>Grand Budapest Hotel</i> in <i>Hansel and Gretel</i>. While these may be references to a largely imaginary Europe, the decision to cut the forest and move the children into an unsecure, labyrinthine hotel evoked scandals closer to home. Owen MacCarthaigh dared to get specific about the Northern Irish scenery in the Troubles satire <i>The Lieutenant of Inishmore</i>, recreating the Free Derry mural for one memorable torture scene. Who can forget the reverse-shot in <i><a href="http://musingsinintermissions.blogspot.com/2020/10/to-be-machine-version-10-review-first.html">To Be a Machine (Version 1.0)</a></i>, a streamed play about entrepreneurs enhancing their bodies through technology, when we realised Andrew Clancy had built stalls for an audience of iPads, all displaying our faces. We were watching at home alone but we were also in the theatre together.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>Hansel and Gretel</i>, an Irish National Opera, Theatre Lovett and Abbey Theatre co-production</b> - Jamie Vartan<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>The Lieutenant of Inishmore</i>, a Gaiety production </b>- Owen MacCarthaigh<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>To Be a Machine (Version 1.0)</i>, a Dead Centre and Dublin Theatre Festival co-production</b> - Andrew Clancy</span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>BEST LIGHTING DESIGN</b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><br /></b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-size: x-large; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEib91UFrPt8D0Q2R3ZPuYW9IE17GUburjDOlahIEFJTQqTHvkFzxPZDVVhK3bQkyy_8ysbXscwVLH6zJkdSgU8oDW1aJ1vnMHLx1SkGsr8_VIbkAjuCapSuQuJ2QQ0j13txDTY9xi9MpYxE/s2048/DruidG.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1152" data-original-width="2048" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEib91UFrPt8D0Q2R3ZPuYW9IE17GUburjDOlahIEFJTQqTHvkFzxPZDVVhK3bQkyy_8ysbXscwVLH6zJkdSgU8oDW1aJ1vnMHLx1SkGsr8_VIbkAjuCapSuQuJ2QQ0j13txDTY9xi9MpYxE/w400-h225/DruidG.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999; font-size: medium;"><i>DruidGregory.</i></span></div></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-size: x-large; text-align: center;"><i><span style="color: #999999; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></i></div></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Most representative of the period when lockdown moved theatre outdoors was Barry O’Brien’s attractive tube lighting for <i><a href="http://musingsinintermissions.blogspot.com/2020/09/druidgregory-review-uneven-blend-of.html">DruidGregory</a></i>, providing the clandestine moon and outlines of old architecture for Lady Gregory’s early-century vision of Galway. When similar effects were seen in photographs of the Abbey Theatre’s promenade play <i>The Great Hunger</i>, it seemed this had become the visual language for the current moment. Sarah-Jane Shiels lit up the foggy, nostalgic world of <i>Hansel and Gretel</i> with neon signs for hotels and bars, but it was in <i><a href="http://musingsinintermissions.blogspot.com/2020/09/transmission-review-crucial-moments.html">Transmission</a></i>, Caitríona Ní Mhurchú’s play about the light-bending power of old communication technologies, where Shiels’s elegant design played a crucial role. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>DruidGregory</i>, a Druid production</b> - Barry O’Brien<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>Hansel and Gretel</i>, an Irish National Opera, Theatre Lovett and Abbey Theatre co-production</b> - Sarah-Jane Shiels<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>Transmission</i>, a Little Wolf production</b> - Sarah-Jane Shiels</span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>BEST COSTUME DESIGN</b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><br /></b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-size: x-large; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCr15UMZzejwyLUd4Mkgq42PgjPu7QIrcza3QWHAk3Lnl-Bv5masJtgI3kGFidFS9SZvwTkrRpxUhP6faKKHv6hYkYbqjybET4WjNafySuPWQULFaX-XvEhSs5VVXMefpsAlQBi8gKPvFY/s512/mamafesta.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="342" data-original-width="512" height="268" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCr15UMZzejwyLUd4Mkgq42PgjPu7QIrcza3QWHAk3Lnl-Bv5masJtgI3kGFidFS9SZvwTkrRpxUhP6faKKHv6hYkYbqjybET4WjNafySuPWQULFaX-XvEhSs5VVXMefpsAlQBi8gKPvFY/w400-h268/mamafesta.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999; font-size: medium;"><i>Mamafesta Memorialising.</i></span></div><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">No garments told as epic a story as Emily Ní Bhrion’s for <a href="http://musingsinintermissions.blogspot.com/2020/02/mamafesta-memorialising-review-superb.html">Philip Connaughton’s superb dance about hereditary dementia</a>, beginning with couture suits made up of home furnishings of curtain tassels and wallpaper florals, and stripping to a spooky nightmare of science-fictional hospital gowns. The powerful anachronism of Vartan’s costuming comes to mind, when two lost children in modern raincoats interrupted the fairy-tale world of <i>Hansel and Gretel</i>. Sinéad Cuthbert did great work on Martin McDonagh’s junk-culture, the discarded pop cultural memorabilia of mullets and <i>Looney Tunes</i> t-shirts, but it was the <i>La Femme Nikita</i> pixie cut given to Aisling Kearns’s violent gunslinger that pushed it over the line. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>Hansel and Gretel</i>, an Irish National Opera, Theatre Lovett and Abbey Theatre co-production</b> - Jamie Vartan<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>Mamafesta Memorialising</i>, a Company Philip Connaughton, KLAP- Maison pour le Danse and Cork Opera House co-production</b> - Emily Ní Bhrion<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>The Lieutenant of Inishmore</i>, a Gaiety production</b> - Sinéad Cuthbert</span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>BEST SOUNDSCAPE</b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><br /></b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-size: x-large; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi12Uf0JiCwSZvcmNRlDszfJNfnx3x-c5Iud57NMnJyFzRTPnFsYKgmhMexN9I_e8Xcy8IBzDSP2WC-M1QwfgPtJCa2IEuTgriphzYAG2Tp36InLjLZQq283cm947DxR7b21yqJ_7oDjpx7/s2048/Will.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1243" data-original-width="2048" height="243" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi12Uf0JiCwSZvcmNRlDszfJNfnx3x-c5Iud57NMnJyFzRTPnFsYKgmhMexN9I_e8Xcy8IBzDSP2WC-M1QwfgPtJCa2IEuTgriphzYAG2Tp36InLjLZQq283cm947DxR7b21yqJ_7oDjpx7/w400-h243/Will.JPG" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999; font-size: medium;"><i>Will I See You There.</i></span></div><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Here we have different soundscapes that stand out for different reasons. Philip Stewart’s music for <i>Our New Girl </i>was a wild score of jabbing pianos darting between time signatures. Sound design was central to the play-installation <i>Will I See You There</i>, which gathered its audience in a room above a city square and allowed them to eavesdrop on reunited friends on the ground below. Jennifer O’Malley’s excellent, ambient sonics replaced the everyday grit of the city with the bright fluidity of a dream, braiding the characters’ spoken dialogue with their private thoughts. Some ingenious wizardry saw <i><a href="http://musingsinintermissions.blogspot.com/2020/04/were-in-here-review-sly-contemporary.html">We’re In Here</a></i>, John Doran’s sly streamed play about role models and parents, begin with Doran fixing a fuzzy video connection by plugging in a microphone powerful enough to pick up the symphonic birdsong outside his window. Streamed theatre no longer seemed like the shadow of something lost but possibly a field of its own. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>Our New Girl</i>, a Gate Theatre production</b> - Philip Stewart<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>We’re In Here</i>, a John Doran production</b> - John Doran<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>Will I See You There</i>, a Murmuration production</b> - Jennifer O’Malley</span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>BEST VIDEO DESIGN</b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><br /></b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-size: x-large; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivcMpW8x1dT8uHh6uJg4K_JvHpw36nTHM-bdCq5MjvrR1OfiwB3Th2cTS2PEVlJHaqe5rZcx52PBkL2uvH1XmCO8B1rqjCNmRSV4uFsrV6QxMAEIbWkJSfSfM6pMq5OUJTeIEMrdumkxcN/s988/Hansel+and.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="496" data-original-width="988" height="201" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivcMpW8x1dT8uHh6uJg4K_JvHpw36nTHM-bdCq5MjvrR1OfiwB3Th2cTS2PEVlJHaqe5rZcx52PBkL2uvH1XmCO8B1rqjCNmRSV4uFsrV6QxMAEIbWkJSfSfM6pMq5OUJTeIEMrdumkxcN/w400-h201/Hansel+and.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><span style="color: #999999; font-size: medium;">Hansel and Gretel.</span></i></div><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Special praise is to be given to Jack Phelan, who followed his epic, towering images for 2018’s <i><a href="http://musingsinintermissions.blogspot.com/2018/10/bluebeards-castle-review-magnificent.html">Bluebeard’s Castle</a> </i>with equally ambitious design this year. The giant arch displays for <i>Hansel and Gretel</i>, resplendent in brush typeface, resembled hotel notices to residents but evolved into cruel wisecracks about home ownership being a distant dream. During the pandemic, Phelan’s video design for <i>To Be a Machine (Version 1.0) </i>was a refreshing break from a lot of streamed theatre that, through its camera-eye storytelling and Zoom-style videotelephony, seemed to be imitating electronic media. Instead, Phelan’s camera made us fall for cunning misdirections and transformations, bringing the classic stuff of stage illusions into the live-stream. How nice to welcome Jason Byrne here too, especially for the beautiful images in <i>Transmission </i>when the Titanic passed beyond a lighthouse beam for the final time. <br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>Hansel and Gretel</i>, an Irish National Opera, Theatre Lovett and Abbey Theatre co-production</b> - Jack Phelan<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>To Be a Machine (Version 1.0)</i>, a Dead Centre and Dublin Theatre Festival co-production</b> - Jack Phelan<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>Transmission</i>, a Little Wolf production</b> - Jason Byrne</span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>BEST MOVEMENT </b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><br /></b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-size: x-large; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqAdHkHuLKOAGaOtChw8rKWDD99khHFc7pzgypwxab_dR80LYzkVaMccTp0xk7aswAeKsM3qmU8KQjOaliIx2a4-pVypbZrBh0T54ltu4BNwVEJMcwnK7eyc_PbcBZNuh3zEfbH6LsECi4/s1900/what.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1069" data-original-width="1900" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqAdHkHuLKOAGaOtChw8rKWDD99khHFc7pzgypwxab_dR80LYzkVaMccTp0xk7aswAeKsM3qmU8KQjOaliIx2a4-pVypbZrBh0T54ltu4BNwVEJMcwnK7eyc_PbcBZNuh3zEfbH6LsECi4/w400-h225/what.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><span style="color: #999999; font-size: medium;">What I (Don't) Know About Autism.</span></i></div><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Some regulars are in here. Bolger lent galvanising movement to Druid’s cycle of Lady Gregory’s plays, especially the physical comedy required for <i>Hyacinth Halvey</i>, a razor-sharp farce about an agriculture official moved to a joyless town and determined to destroy his good reputation. Connaughton showed nerve pouring his own biography into his epic choreography for <i>Mamafesta Memorialising</i>, whether it was gestures of him strutting like a diva, having sex, or knocking sadly on closed doors. Also, Cindy Cummings’s clever, detailed choreography marshalled the ensemble play <i>What I (Don’t) Know About Autism</i> through its excellent parodies of ableist myths.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>DruidGregory</i>, a Druid production</b> - David Bolger<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>Mamafesta Memorialising</i>, a Company Philip Connaughton, KLAP- Maison pour le Danse and Cork Opera House co-production</b> - Philip Connaughton<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>What I (Don’t) Know About Autism</i>, a Jody O’Neill and Abbey Theatre co-production</b> - Cindy Cummings</span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>BEST NEW PLAY</b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><br /></b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-size: x-large; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZtIfWW2xSvcTE4X1HAAgbVlpHHPYFaRJblli-6UB6_yV6vwEzTXGBJuotxvSNHQhI3aeU6Xqlga8vnVtK5mtAsmQGecUWW4HTq-jXtRWI8js_Ce2zCiBzW6eXAwYbH7DGyrpnPLBa8w-7/s1154/were.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="647" data-original-width="1154" height="224" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZtIfWW2xSvcTE4X1HAAgbVlpHHPYFaRJblli-6UB6_yV6vwEzTXGBJuotxvSNHQhI3aeU6Xqlga8vnVtK5mtAsmQGecUWW4HTq-jXtRWI8js_Ce2zCiBzW6eXAwYbH7DGyrpnPLBa8w-7/w400-h224/were.png" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><span style="color: #999999; font-size: medium;">We're In Here.</span></i></div><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Nothing here fell in with tradition. Jody O’Neill’s <i>What I (Don’t) Know About Autism</i>, which could easily be the title of a straight-up theatre-in-education play, was a sophisticated work of parody and subversion. Written episodically with clever call-back scenes, it wittily undercut psychiatric myths about autism. The switch between spoken dialogue and internal thoughts in James Elliott’s <i>Will I See You There </i>wasn’t as revelatory as the crushing details of its story of how two friends misunderstood each other during one crucial phone call. Ní Mhurchú found the balance between philosophical reference and theatrical conceit in <i>Transmission</i>. Doran, previously the writer of the broad multiple-role comedy <i>The Centre of the Universe</i>, went contemporary with the subtly mingling narratives and intertextual storytelling of <i>We’re In Here</i>.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"> </span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>Caitríona Ní Mhurchú </b>- <i>Transmission</i>, a Little Wolf production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>James Elliott</b> - <i>Will I See You There</i>, a Murmuration production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>Jody O’Neill </b>- <i>What I (Don’t) Know About Autism</i>, a Jody O’Neill and Abbey Theatre co-production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>John Doran</b> - <i>We’re In Here</i>, a John Doran production</span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>BEST PERFORMANCE</b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><br /></b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-size: x-large; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIKNCekc5mKZAelBgcBo707PS7B-ubx_KmZq1-D7RAaWxB6Fzl__5JjNQ7IP7uVdXtigcBOrZGQvrAZC8fqEdgm-23cERZGjF7xdAfF8oLYD3sbVSnd5AX_N9jMgoKUhhTxtBNuw93bNYx/s1000/our+new.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIKNCekc5mKZAelBgcBo707PS7B-ubx_KmZq1-D7RAaWxB6Fzl__5JjNQ7IP7uVdXtigcBOrZGQvrAZC8fqEdgm-23cERZGjF7xdAfF8oLYD3sbVSnd5AX_N9jMgoKUhhTxtBNuw93bNYx/w400-h266/our+new.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><span style="color: #999999; font-size: medium;">Our New Girl.</span></i></div><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">There are many reasons to celebrate <i>Our New Girl</i>. The comeback story of Catherine Walker, a stylish actor who in the past has been clumsily slotted into roles wedded to underplayed realism (literally Hedda Gabbler), giving a thrilling performance as a mother in a psychological thriller, battling through the gaslighting tactics of her husband and their nanny, was one reason. As said husband, Aidan McArdle, who we’ve seen before playing a shouting man-child as good as anyone could, gave a delicious portrayal of a bad man’s subtler evils. And there was the terrific breakout performance by Bláithín Mac Gabhann, whose creepy ambivalence as their nanny was summed up by a smile just wide enough to vaguely belong in a horror play. Elsewhere, Carolyn Dobbyn gave a tremendous comic performance in <i>Hansel and Gretel</i>, her witch singing about cooking children with the same charming wiles of a beloved celebrity chef. Finbarr Doyle had to play to the upper circle, so to speak, as a man having an excruciating run-in with a friend in <i>Will I See You There</i>, which the audience watched from a viewing gallery high above a city square. It was still the stealthy comic performance of the year, his agonising face-scrunches and stressed teeth-clenches delivered from far away without pulling the subtle play into broader comedy. Finally, there was a superb parody of a Republican terrorist by some guy named Paul Mescal. </span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>Aidan McArdle</b> - <i>Our New Girl</i>, a Gate Theatre production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>Bláithín Mac Gabhann</b> - <i>Our New Girl</i>, a Gate Theatre production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>Catherine Walker</b> - <i>Our New Girl</i>, a Gate Theatre production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>Carolyn Dobbin</b> - <i>Hansel and Gretel</i>, an Irish National Opera, Theatre Lovett and Abbey Theatre co-production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>Finnbar Doyle</b> - <i>Will I See You There</i>, a Murmuration production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>Paul Mescal</b> - <i>The Lieutenant of Inishmore</i>, a Gaiety production</span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>BEST ENSEMBLE</b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><br /></b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-size: x-large; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6B54q8NIcIbutkpubC_Gw-CvUMfCFcfMpoY8pmey8Of6VeJPBlKdxPcDFMcmcsb6Tav5hWQlFZQnB5Cglz1e7eOtklifjzMDwb7FAnDa2_q2QqF7-oNBYoDezryE_kVcqbxpS6g1Fdcue/s640/seraglio.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="480" data-original-width="640" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6B54q8NIcIbutkpubC_Gw-CvUMfCFcfMpoY8pmey8Of6VeJPBlKdxPcDFMcmcsb6Tav5hWQlFZQnB5Cglz1e7eOtklifjzMDwb7FAnDa2_q2QqF7-oNBYoDezryE_kVcqbxpS6g1Fdcue/w400-h300/seraglio.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999; font-size: medium;"><i>Seraglio, the Mini-series.</i></span></div><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">The category for plays where singling out a single performance is impossible. The cast of <i><a href="http://musingsinintermissions.blogspot.com/2020/01/flights-review-sad-dispossession-of-our.html">Flights</a></i>, John O’Donovan’s drama about three friends dispossessed in the years since the 2008 economic crash, were funny and sad. Philip Connaughton got help in portraying his subject, himself, from sublime dancers Kévin Coquelard and Tatanka Gomboud. Irish National Opera’s reimagining of <i>The Abduction from the Seraglio</i> into <a href="http://musingsinintermissions.blogspot.com/2020/07/seraglio-review-opera-from-lost-season.html">a miniseries set in lockdown Dublin</a> saw a group of friends get lovesick for each other. Despite being recorded in their separate homes, the cast eventually came together in bracing symphony in the series finale. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>Flights</i></b>, a One Duck production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>Mamafesta Memorialising</i></b>, a Company Philip Connaughton, KLAP- Maison pour le Danse and Cork Opera House co-production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>Seraglio, the Mini-series</i></b>, an Irish National Opera production </span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><u>NOTES</u></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><u><br /></u></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>BEST BREAKTHROUGH</b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><br /></b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-size: x-large; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfwR2FDwe7INhdlHeHfi9ivhVd3XLVsga2kgLDNBWQjGJaGWiI7vRhyphenhyphenpeoOOliIoXOq6PyJ1IhIK04xKmEenC4yGnv6ynWD4H5n562UstwrASjskx6aXHzIOZT0wvGbFkjGX4sJ6OAhizj/s1024/Lieutenant+of.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="683" data-original-width="1024" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfwR2FDwe7INhdlHeHfi9ivhVd3XLVsga2kgLDNBWQjGJaGWiI7vRhyphenhyphenpeoOOliIoXOq6PyJ1IhIK04xKmEenC4yGnv6ynWD4H5n562UstwrASjskx6aXHzIOZT0wvGbFkjGX4sJ6OAhizj/w400-h266/Lieutenant+of.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999; font-size: medium;"><i>The Lieutenant of Inishmore.</i></span></div><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">I might get some guff for saying any of these are breakthroughs. Mac Gabhann was an ensemble member in <i><a href="http://musingsinintermissions.blogspot.com/2019/05/citysong-review-wordy-play-about-dublin.html">Citysong</a></i>. Kearns was in the second run of <i><a href="http://musingsinintermissions.blogspot.com/2018/11/asking-for-it-review-home-truths-on.html">Asking For It</a></i>. Amy Ní Fhearraigh, who played Gretel in <i>Hansel and Gretel</i>, had previously been in <i><a href="http://exeuntmagazine.com/reviews/review-marriage-figaro-gaiety-theatre-dublin/">The Marriage of Figaro</a></i>. And Alex Murphy has a lead role in <i>The Young Offenders</i>. But the below performances were breakthroughs that feel significant. If Kearns gave a revelatory performance as a violently deranged gunwoman in T<i>he Lieutenant of Inishmore</i>, Murphy was just as important as the foil of that play, playing up the wonderful misery of an innocent passer-by who walks into the crosshairs of a sociopath. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>Bláithín Mac Gabhann</b> - <i>Our New Girl</i>, a Gate Theatre production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>Aisling Kearns</b> - <i>The Lieutenant of Inishmore</i>, a Gaiety production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>Amy Ní Fhearraigh</b> - <i>Hansel and Gretel</i>, an Irish National Opera, Theatre Lovett and Abbey Theatre co-production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>Alex Murphy</b> - <i>The Lieutenant of Inishmore</i>, a Gaiety production</span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>BEST COMEBACK</b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikZ8BJvmdf0V0gly3kFtiQGPgB4C940TRD9RmzxqyHlRjUTTGNIOzKfMHbf-wzMa_fYZ1O8pPBRDUpgwtmfQS-_jSn3F0-hbQpLwoMkzz4Ugfn7VTZhFzU6fAHCNhkZV9REVB5f8bzrraM/s2000/Transmission.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1333" data-original-width="2000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikZ8BJvmdf0V0gly3kFtiQGPgB4C940TRD9RmzxqyHlRjUTTGNIOzKfMHbf-wzMa_fYZ1O8pPBRDUpgwtmfQS-_jSn3F0-hbQpLwoMkzz4Ugfn7VTZhFzU6fAHCNhkZV9REVB5f8bzrraM/w400-h266/Transmission.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999;"><i>Transmission.</i></span></div><br /><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Walker’s first stage performance in years was stylish and sincere. You’d be grateful to have Dobbin back, returned to these shores after being long lost to overseas. Ní Mhurchú’s playwriting follow-up to 2014's <i>Eating Seals and Seagulls’ Eggs</i>, a biography of Peig Sayers that said too much too acridly, was an inviting and sentimental play about family and the reassuring power of old communications technology. Most poignant, of course, is looking back on the return of the powerful soprano Miriam Murphy, who aided Muireann Ahern and Louis Lovett as the mother in <i>Hansel and Gretel</i>, and who sadly died this year. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>Catherine Walker</b> - <i>Our New Girl</i>, a Gate Theatre production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>Miriam Murphy</b> - <i>Hansel and Gretel</i>, an Irish National Opera, Theatre Lovett and Abbey Theatre co-production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>Carolyn Dobbin</b> - <i>Hansel and Gretel</i>, an Irish National Opera, Theatre Lovett and Abbey Theatre co-production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>Caitríona Ní Mhurchú </b>- <i>Transmission</i>, a Little Wolf production</span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>WORST PRODUCTION</b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><br /></b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-size: x-large; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-5P3tv0mDKYTN5BR8hhNtQDkvBHuiVraSSJ58Py8E8cQvAq1TN6nhTZKA_A5LFTZM1Lfdl8eRCgoPIRJ5Z2X7bOZmt5S4CYS2eRb9EpV3muW8y5bP07h32Sk4E4vzU3QWOfYLPSHHLjTM/s614/Lucrece.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="345" data-original-width="614" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-5P3tv0mDKYTN5BR8hhNtQDkvBHuiVraSSJ58Py8E8cQvAq1TN6nhTZKA_A5LFTZM1Lfdl8eRCgoPIRJ5Z2X7bOZmt5S4CYS2eRb9EpV3muW8y5bP07h32Sk4E4vzU3QWOfYLPSHHLjTM/w400-h225/Lucrece.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999; font-size: medium;"><i>What Happened to Lucrece?</i></span></div><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Stream of consciousness must be one of the most difficult literary techniques to adapt for theatre, and in the case of <i><a href="http://musingsinintermissions.blogspot.com/2020/08/solar-bones-review-experimental-novel.html">Solar Bones</a></i>, a tale of a dead man returned to his home on All Souls’ Day, it made for an absurdly random play. <i><a href="http://musingsinintermissions.blogspot.com/2020/02/the-fall-of-second-republic-review-dark.html">The Fall of the Second Republic</a></i>, a comedy set in an alternative Ireland where a Taoiseach conspires to hold onto power, brought macho-political burlesque to Haughey-era politics, but was lacking in screwball comedy comeuppance. Also missing was the conclusion, no less, to <i><a href="http://musingsinintermissions.blogspot.com/2020/10/the-party-to-end-all-parties-review.html">The Party to End All Parties</a></i>, a streamed play pitting modern-day Dubliners in the shadow of the 1949 celebrations of Ireland becoming a Republic, as director Louise Lowe let the story disappear unfinished into the play’s spectacular cityscape. Andew Synnott’s multiple-ending opera <i><a href="http://musingsinintermissions.blogspot.com/2020/10/what-happened-to-lucrece-review.html">What Happened to Lucrece?</a></i> started as an experiment in subversion but ended in cliché.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>Solar Bones</i></b>, a Kilkenny Arts Festival production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>The Fall of the Second Republic</i></b>, a Corn Exchange and Abbey Theatre co-production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>The Party to End All Parties</i></b>, an ANU and Dublin Theatre Festival co-production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>What Happened to Lucrece?</i></b>, a Wexford Festival Opera production</span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b>WHAT I MISSED WHILE LOOKING IN THE WRONG PLACE</b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><br /></b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-size: x-large; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKWQRar4tLIiTMGqH03eVzsgCHGNengW8FVzvkaLM4GOzpkJIVWwL2avuQCEPaRcST9RVR5A3IrxeKUnqw-ULwold7rwL-EBLiH7fz9IERXivJ3CV31hKxofvliQogRbdOVh8jkDayqN92/s2048/contact.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1366" data-original-width="2048" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKWQRar4tLIiTMGqH03eVzsgCHGNengW8FVzvkaLM4GOzpkJIVWwL2avuQCEPaRcST9RVR5A3IrxeKUnqw-ULwold7rwL-EBLiH7fz9IERXivJ3CV31hKxofvliQogRbdOVh8jkDayqN92/w400-h266/contact.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999; font-size: medium;"><i>Contact.</i></span></div><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Corcadorca’s <i>Contact</i>, a physical theatre play staged in the dark early days of lockdown, saw two separated lovers reunite on either side of a Perspex screen. The Abbey Theatre adapted Patrick Kavanagh’s poem <i>The Great Hunger</i> into a promenade play. Emma Martin’s dance for young audiences <i>Birdboy</i> was about a boy wishing to be a bird because he doesn’t fit in. I missed <i>Kiss Me, Kate</i>, a revival of Cole Porter’s musical comedy set behind the scenes of a production of <i>The Taming of the Shrew</i>. It’s impossible to see everything.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>Birdboy</i></b>, a United Fall production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>Contact</i></b>, a Corcadorca and Cork Midsummer Festival co-production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>Kiss Me, Kate</i></b>, a Lyric Theatre and Northern Ireland Opera co-production<br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><b><i>The Great Hunger</i></b>, an Abbey Theatre production</span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><i>Like what you're reading? Buy me a coffee at <a href="https://ko-fi.com/chrismccormack"><b>https://ko-fi.com/chrismccormack</b></a></i></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div>Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-71395956983368076272020-10-14T17:15:00.000-07:002020-10-14T17:15:11.058-07:00What Happened to Lucrece review: A catastrophe of an opera experiment <p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEdBcfup_eIItwFlTf4xVolGjzZffTxyHWQ5ZH0cjotzhLff-vfpm_-EemO1IC55giQ-SgaDnlNhjQXEhFPn4TkvWjpi7bqxSjqvrDw_bvY8-NYc9asNu-LOwE_marW8slJzdzVuL6dTXX/s1420/Rory+Musgrave+as+Sextus+and+Sarah+Richmond+as+Lucrece++in+%2527What+Happend+to+Lucrece%2527+by+Andrew+Synnott+WFO2020+-+photo+by+Padraig+Grant.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="829" data-original-width="1420" height="234" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEdBcfup_eIItwFlTf4xVolGjzZffTxyHWQ5ZH0cjotzhLff-vfpm_-EemO1IC55giQ-SgaDnlNhjQXEhFPn4TkvWjpi7bqxSjqvrDw_bvY8-NYc9asNu-LOwE_marW8slJzdzVuL6dTXX/w400-h234/Rory+Musgrave+as+Sextus+and+Sarah+Richmond+as+Lucrece++in+%2527What+Happend+to+Lucrece%2527+by+Andrew+Synnott+WFO2020+-+photo+by+Padraig+Grant.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999;">Based on Shakespeare's tragic poem <i>The Rape of Lucrece</i>, each performance of Wexford Festival Opera's eccentric opera features a different ending.<i> </i>Photo: Padraig Grant</span></div><br /><p></p><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; color: white;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: medium;"><b><span><a name='more'></a></span>Wexford Festival Opera</b></span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: Georgia, Utopia, "Palatino Linotype", Palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><b style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: large;">★ </b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: Georgia, Utopia, "Palatino Linotype", Palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><b style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">Accusations in recent years have made looking at art twice a common reflex. Almost 500 years ago, Machiavelli’s satire of Florentine high society<i> La Mandragola</i> had a scene where two lovers get into bed. The woman, young and beautiful in fashionable silk, is nervous with self-doubt. The man is her trusted doctor, covered head-to-toe in black robes, his face red with alcohol. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">As they throw the bed-sheets over themselves, it isn’t lost on the audience that the man is actually an imposter in disguise, having conspired with the woman’s close allies to drug her beforehand. Any unease may have been pushed from everyone’s minds by the heavy make-up and broad gags of commedia erudita. Move along folks, nothing to see here. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">There was a time when showing images of sexual violence was too disturbing. They were signposted through flashes of melodrama instead. But what if an opera, in this more admissible age, took a rare exception such as Shakespeare’s narrative poem<i> The Rape of Lucrece</i> and deliberately made its violence elusive and difficult to find? </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">The reflex of Wexford Festival Opera’s new opera <i>What Happened to Lucrece</i>, composed by Andrew Synnott, isn’t to look at this artwork twice but three times. Each streamed performance features a different ending, written to be either tragic, farcical or romantic.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">Lucrece (Sarah Richmond) returns home from a corporate job to her modern-day London apartment, an abode made of pink paint and portraits of women in director Rosetta Cucchi’s design. Her artist flatmate Collatine (Kathleen Norchi) is off to the pub but Lucrece decides to stay in and prepare a work presentation, despite a loose acquaintance Sextus (Rory Musgrave) hoping to see her. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">As director, some of Cucchi’s decisions are difficult to fathom. Against the palpable unease of Synnott’s music, a satisfying stylish clatter of piano, the cloying jollity of Lucrece and her thoughtful friend Fran (Sarah Shine) emphatically tickling each other and blowing widely on their hot coffees makes for a peculiar blend of tones. It’s hard to believe that the basis for this eccentric opera is a tragic poem about a soldier’s wife getting attacked and raped. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><i>The Rape of Lucrece</i> has found music before. A cabaret adaptation by Camille O’Sullivan gave touching clarity to the poem’s psychological trauma and male violence. It also fell into the trap laid by the poetry's beautified aesthetic for depicting a harrowing assault, and created its own overly attractive images. Rather than repeat such pain and horror, there is something to be said for subversion, for changing Lucrece’s fate. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">In this performance the opera ends as a farce. Sextus, sloshed and aggressive, arrives and attempts to manhandle Lucrece. She takes advantage of his drunken confusion and posts compromising photos of him online, which in an age of consent doesn’t feel as clean-cut a revenge. Nor is there anything powerful musically, as Synnott hasn’t written any elevating music for soprano for the standoff. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">Towards the end Cucchi’s libretto, co-written by Alessandra Binucci, gathers Lucrece and her friends into a Girl Power declaration to face the dangers of the world together. The experiment in subversion ends catastrophically with cliché. As in times past, images of violence disappear behind the feel-good fronts of uplifting comedy, as if they never happened. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><i>Streaming on RTE.ie/Culture until October 15th. </i></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span></div></div></div>Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-54537312283473516952020-10-12T17:29:00.000-07:002020-10-12T17:29:14.244-07:00Embargo review: A play dressed like a War of Independence thriller <p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihXdco9eHZwCog0laZG20wjK_B8H8S0KTTufpdQgBXEyL7TPRXFHAmUsC9dAsyt1h1GVPDf0u7VIint0Jrly1NuXuCQdq7E8K7wIKUcY1QklttONeEk2nk46w_pTlPnq0wx515U0LJIDLA/s2048/Callan+Cummins+Matthew+Malone+and+Mary+Murray+in+Fishambles+EMBARGO.+Pho.._+%2528003%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1365" data-original-width="2048" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihXdco9eHZwCog0laZG20wjK_B8H8S0KTTufpdQgBXEyL7TPRXFHAmUsC9dAsyt1h1GVPDf0u7VIint0Jrly1NuXuCQdq7E8K7wIKUcY1QklttONeEk2nk46w_pTlPnq0wx515U0LJIDLA/w400-h266/Callan+Cummins+Matthew+Malone+and+Mary+Murray+in+Fishambles+EMBARGO.+Pho.._+%2528003%2529.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999;">A train driver must decide between assisting the IRA or helping a vulnerable woman in Deirdre Kinahan's new play. Photo: Anthony Woods</span></div><span><a name='more'></a></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><p></p><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; color: white; font-family: Georgia, Utopia, "Palatino Linotype", Palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><b style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: large;">Dublin Theatre Festival</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; color: white; font-family: Georgia, Utopia, "Palatino Linotype", Palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><b style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: large;">★ ★ </b></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; color: white; font-family: Georgia, Utopia, "Palatino Linotype", Palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><b style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif;">In thrillers, a high-speed pace helps build tension and create suspense. Writers can move things up a gear by putting in a vehicle that’s being pursued, a scene showing a car chase perhaps. </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif;"><br /></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif;">Fishamble’s new play <i>Embargo</i>, written by Deirdre Kinahan, is set inside a train cab but the wheels don’t start turning for quite a while. When the driver Gracie (Matthew Malone) first turns to us, against the heavy mystery of Denis Clohessy’s ambient music, he gives a surreal account of being set upon by attackers, and covered in tar and feathers. In his eyes, he sees himself like Icarus, ready to fly. </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif;"><br /></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif;">To an audience, we might see an omen of evil things ahead, of wax wings melting over dark waters. It’s an intriguing symbol stored in the mind, but as the script gathers the rest of its characters together during the War of Independence in Dublin, there are signs of too much technique. After Jack (Callan Cummins), an IRA fighter, sets the scene saying “This is the morning in question,” other figures repeat the word “Morning” in serious concert with each other, as if we didn’t hear it the first time. </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif;"><br /></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif;">Though attracted to these repetitions, the chanting rhythms of something supernatural, Kinahan’s script shows variance in its chosen viewpoints of the war. In Mary Murray’s desperate Jane, who jumps into the cab while fleeing the police, we get a whole new set of priorities. Here is a woman volcanic with rage about how the labour movement was sacrificed by the fight for Independence, who is forced into precarity and might go to jail, leaving her children to starve. </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif;"><br /></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif;">That puts Gracie in a difficult position. Bound by an arms embargo organised in solidarity with the IRA, he can assist Jane by breaking that order and put the train into motion, or paralyse the British forces on-board by keeping the locomotive at a standstill. </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif;"><br /></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif;">The plot twist allows for interesting opposing forces that stir anticipation, pitting Jane against Cummins’s threatening Jack, the safe passage of a vulnerable woman against the demands of a republican struggle. But there aren’t any elaborate cover-ups, or the skilful distractions of red herrings. There isn’t a train racing against time. </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif;"><br /></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif;">While <i>Embargo</i> can look dressed like a thriller, it doesn’t peddle much in false clues or bottling suspense. Rather, its jolts between dialogue and monologue, neatly contained by director Maisie Lee’s production, delve into hidden histories. Recalling Gracie’s time enrolled in the English army in WWI, Malone’s face reveals a hidden suggestive smile, and says “Hard to believe it now but I was a pin-up,” conjuring up new visions of life at the front. </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif;"><br /></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif;">These backstories offer fresh perspectives but they also deviate from the urgency of events at hand. Towards the end, we are met with something tragic, a sad casualty of war, but the lack of momentum robs it of some impact. </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif;"><br /></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif;">Streaming on fishamble.com </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Georgia, Utopia, "Palatino Linotype", Palatino, serif;"> </span></i></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Georgia, Utopia, "Palatino Linotype", Palatino, serif;"><br /></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div></div></div>Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-10839173266697511532020-10-09T18:09:00.000-07:002020-10-09T18:09:13.911-07:00The Party to End All Parties review: Plot and character disappear into a spectacularly beautiful cityscape<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvDtv2sttX-6_KmlifRNR9ppnrWEoxSZn96GTL7hF5SOIMb5D8Pu3_UxvVsTg3FFLqCSavllJ-gHNPwgLdpga1kIkEUnjaOiIRZgoxtxU-XUo7SZkgaQf1hhY4jspiZXYNGnrRBkr-FZWQ/s1366/Screen+Shot+2020-10-10+at+01.39.45.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="768" data-original-width="1366" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvDtv2sttX-6_KmlifRNR9ppnrWEoxSZn96GTL7hF5SOIMb5D8Pu3_UxvVsTg3FFLqCSavllJ-gHNPwgLdpga1kIkEUnjaOiIRZgoxtxU-XUo7SZkgaQf1hhY4jspiZXYNGnrRBkr-FZWQ/w400-h225/Screen+Shot+2020-10-10+at+01.39.45.png" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999;">Taking place against the<span style="text-align: left;"> 1949 celebrations of Ireland becoming a Republic, ANU and Dublin Theatre Festival's streamed play is about unfulfilled promises and lives falling apart. Photo: ANU </span></span></div><span><a name='more'></a></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; color: white; font-family: Georgia, Utopia, "Palatino Linotype", Palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px; text-align: start;"><b style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: large;">Dublin Theatre Festival</b></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; color: white; font-family: Georgia, Utopia, "Palatino Linotype", Palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px; text-align: start;"><b style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: large;">★ ★ </b></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; color: white; font-family: Georgia, Utopia, "Palatino Linotype", Palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px; text-align: start;"><b style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; text-align: start;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">Dublin looks truly beautiful in <i>The Party to End All Parties</i>, the new streamed play by ANU and Dublin Theatre Festival. The halogen yellows of streetlights on a quay near O’Connell Bridge bleed into a moody blue dusk, a spectacle that repeats on the river Liffey below. Elevating the cityscape to the sublime in director Louise Lowe’s production, its camera shots taking in the overwhelming tone and colour, the main drama here might lie in the scenery. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">Inside the sheeny office of a property developer, we see a grim vision for the city’s future, as a video presentation enthuses about the pandemic being a catalyst for the city’s next regeneration. While the project’s biodiversity expert (Nandi Bhebhe) frustrates over her colleagues' ignorance, the long-term consequences of bad planning manifest in startling ways. Carl Kennedy’s excellent sound design not only evokes the destructive rise of sea levels, it also allows for the horror of Bhebhe’s black woman getting shot by gunfire, the blasts blurring into the firework recordings of the April 1949 celebrations on the night Ireland became a Republic. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">As the production descends onto the quays, that historical event full of potential and achievement - immortalised in a striking photograph that shows O’Connell Bridge thronged with people - forms a shadow in which other characters are trapped. “My indecision to do anything is the strongest decision I ever made,” says a woman (Niamh McCann), staring self-defeated onto the river. Ignoring calls to pick up her husband at a mental health hospital, she seems stuck in this odd, serene paralysis. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">Less clear are the woes torturing a man (Robbie O’Conner) awaiting a court ruling about custody of his child. He details the breakdown of his relationship, the shame of telling his mother and the interference of family members, but his account becomes misty, possibly blurring into that of someone from a previous era. There are references to clashes on O’Connell Street, and of being outraged by what happened to someone named Terence. Could this be the Sinn Féin hunger striker Terence McSwiney? Are these episodes from the revolutionary period 100 years ago? It’s difficult to know for sure. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">If this is a drama about unfulfilled promises, of lives falling apart on O’Connell Bridge where the Republic was once ringed in, it seems to lack an emotional lift. There is a nice touch in recalling the old Ballast time ball, once installed on a building top overlooking the bridge, signalling that Dublin kept to a 25-minute difference to Greenwich Mean Time. There’s extra time to change things after all. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">Yet, the play doesn’t end with these stories reaching a conclusion, with either the discovery of renewed promise or with the devastation of accepting their personal limbos. An impresario of site-specific theatre, Lowe seems here to prefer the sublime environment as a way out, sending the characters out of focus to disappear into the spectacularly beautiful cityscape, the plot along with them. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><i>Online until Oct 10th.</i></span></div></div></div><p></p>Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-3237870632832987662020-10-02T14:35:00.000-07:002020-10-02T14:35:30.894-07:00To Be a Machine (Version 1.0) review: The first major streamed play is here <p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpKum2Wp23ncZUnOkJF78XFQsxAR8mKv7rumvPvK7urACk0GwKPvsB5mGqxePbo3pwICj2Ug_eTftoE_nbjsYjJOjn-_Y_PCfkcH52Qxl1v3wNPq3ejrchSSeG7v8cdW8JIxGasEjmxwC1/s1600/Jack+Gleeson+in+To+Be+a+Machine+pic+a.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="922" data-original-width="1600" height="230" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpKum2Wp23ncZUnOkJF78XFQsxAR8mKv7rumvPvK7urACk0GwKPvsB5mGqxePbo3pwICj2Ug_eTftoE_nbjsYjJOjn-_Y_PCfkcH52Qxl1v3wNPq3ejrchSSeG7v8cdW8JIxGasEjmxwC1/w400-h230/Jack+Gleeson+in+To+Be+a+Machine+pic+a.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999;">An adaptation of writer Mark O'Connell's book about encountering members of the transhumanism movement brings classic illusion to streamed theatre. Photo: Ben Kidd / Dead Centre</span></div><span><a name='more'></a></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><p></p><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><b style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">Dublin Theatre Festival</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both;"><b style="color: white; font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: large;">★ ★ ★ ★ </b></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both;"><b style="color: white; font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">In this agonising era of separation, in which most plays are viewed alone through a screen, how can theatre resist being subsumed into the omnipresent, everyday flow of streaming media? </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">Despite innovations like substituting the audience with the camera eye, or using the back-and-forth of videotelephony to hot-wire an interactive play, the energy of assembly is harder still to recapture. In their new streamed play <i>To Be a Machine (Version 1.0)</i>, co-produced by Dublin Theatre Festival, Dead Centre and Mark O’Connell recognise this loss as pathos. There is potential in a play about how we miss sitting in a theatre together. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">Adapted from O’Connell’s non-fiction book of the same name, this is a fascinating tale of a travelling writer encountering members of the transhumanism movement. From the empty auditorium of Project Arts Centre, Mark (Jack Gleeson) recalls entrepreneurs devoted to enhancing their bodies through technology. Think of a biometric scanner implanted in your arm. (Or directing your eyes into a screen to resurrect some lost sense of theatre). </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">As an early version of a future play, not everything seems fully baked. For instance, there isn’t all that much that sends Gleeson’s affable, shirt-tucked Mark into his extraordinary quest. Nor does everything he say land as confidently as it is delivered. “They say theatre is a dying art form. I like to think of it as a place where people are dying together,” says Mark. Come again? </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">Mark may be better taken as a narrator, ushering in the transhumanism disciples who are the pillars of the story. In other hands this could be something esoteric, like hearing from a roundtable of theorists, but Dead Centre have been transforming philosophy into enchanting, ludicrous mises en scène for the greater part of a decade. There’s a stunning moment when directors Bush Moukarzel and Ben Kidd reverse the camera shot to show one bio-hacker’s vision of leaving the human body. There, in the darkened stalls of the theatre, an audience of iPads are seated in rows, displaying our faces. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">Whether disembodied or corporeal, we watch Mark share compelling ideas about where humanity is headed. One futurist foresees human minds being uploaded into cloud storage. Conjecture gets powerfully delivered as metaphor, as an auditorium of sleeping theatregoers evokes the strange slumber of cryogenically frozen bodies somewhere in an Arizona desert facility. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">Alive to classic inheritances, the smoke and mirrors of a stage, this is the first major streamed play of the genre. Moukarzel and Kidd, aided by video designer Jack Phelan’s miraculous displays, seem to have mastered the electronic media that much theatre now regularly imitates, but channel it into the self-reflexivity of contemporary theatre. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">Even Jack Gleeson gets a moment to confront himself, a former child star seizing an opportunity to finally become someone else. If Jack and Mark’s struggle for dominance, playing out the tensions between being upgraded and being replaced, isn’t fully mapped, we can hope it’ll come in Version 2.0. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">The play’s resonance is better summed up in a scene about the story of Gilgamesh, an ancient mythic king whose body was so ravaged by grief, he went on a search for immortality. Storytelling too is a kind of uploading, transferring us into something else. To be an audience, perhaps. We kind of were. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><i>Until 10th October.</i></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span></div></div></div>Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-13188256107489720402020-09-22T06:36:00.008-07:002020-09-22T06:36:55.946-07:00DruidGregory review: An uneven blend of razor-sharp comedy and muffled song<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGZjSHgSfTbSkSX5zKA85AI-6HBR1kxIZx3aWlnLkBGKBwSm0cWPTB27K3747uhoWrEJBWgMfNR4TLHBaPpXrN9V2mQzQwMIZPLkqg_k4PyXg_0ZduWW4z_A26BinuA0OkqaQzPeMN6C8e/s2048/Rory+Nolan%252C+Sarah+Morris%252C+Peter+Daly%252C+Donal+Gallery%252C+Liam+Heslin%252C+Venetia+Bowe.+DruidGregory.+Hyacinth+Halvey.+Photo+credit%252C+Matthew+Thompson.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1463" data-original-width="2048" height="286" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGZjSHgSfTbSkSX5zKA85AI-6HBR1kxIZx3aWlnLkBGKBwSm0cWPTB27K3747uhoWrEJBWgMfNR4TLHBaPpXrN9V2mQzQwMIZPLkqg_k4PyXg_0ZduWW4z_A26BinuA0OkqaQzPeMN6C8e/w400-h286/Rory+Nolan%252C+Sarah+Morris%252C+Peter+Daly%252C+Donal+Gallery%252C+Liam+Heslin%252C+Venetia+Bowe.+DruidGregory.+Hyacinth+Halvey.+Photo+credit%252C+Matthew+Thompson.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999;">Druid's cycle of plays by Lady Gregory is set in an early-century version of Galway, where communities are splintered by divisions and persuasive songs are in the air. Photo: Matthew Thompson</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><b style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><span><a name='more'></a></span>Coole Park, Galway</b></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; color: white; font-family: Georgia, Utopia, "Palatino Linotype", Palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><b>★ </b></span><b style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">★</b><span style="background-color: transparent; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif;"><b><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></b></span></span><span style="background-color: transparent;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif;"><b><span style="font-size: large;">★ </span> </b></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; color: white; font-family: Georgia, Utopia, "Palatino Linotype", Palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="background-color: transparent;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif;"><b><br /></b></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">“That’s no song to be singing in these times,” says a police sergeant with grim caution, early in Druid’s cycle of plays by Lady Gregory. The tune describes the pirate queen Granuaile as shackled by English oppressors and wailing into the wind. To a patriot, the song could be dangerous enough to ignite a soul-changing conversion. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">There are a few persuasive melodies in these plays, set in an early-century version of Galway where communities are splintered by divisions. When Garrett Lombard’s stone faced sergeant opens up to a mysterious ballad singer (Marty Rea) about rebel songs he sang in his youth, they sit back-to-back on a quay, resembling two sides of one conflict. A sympathetic Royal Irish Constabulary officer making ends meet on one hand, and a rebel risking his life to revolt against the crown on the other. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">Gregory’s script seems to pave the way to these tensions with comic flourishes, with eye-winking disguises and played up physical obstacles. Surprisingly, against the sweepingly picturesque surroundings of Coole Park, the solemnity of director Garry Hynes’s production seems to suffocate such comedy, much like the heavy details of Francis O’Connor’s costuming, occasionally muffling the ballad singer’s voice. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">Elsewhere, such graveness finds its mark. When we follow the mother (Marie Mullen) and wife (Sarah Morris) of an imprisoned man to a jail, we hear their fears of him being a police informer via chunks of exposition that are difficult to camouflage. But as Mullen’s face scrunches into an admirable picture of determination, her woman undertaking a mission to clear her son’s name by keening throughout the county, the play finds a disarming release. </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">People can be immortalised in folklore, and to stage these plays is to treat their music as serious plot devices, as turnarounds of fortunes. After the death of a poor woman in <i>McDonough’s Wife</i>, two tormenting hags (Venetia Bowe and Megan Cusack) insist she will never be mourned. Yet, her husband’s pipe music summons townspeople to help bury her. In Gregory’s tragedy, there is faith that when people hear the good word they will believe it. </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">That may seem an easy deus ex machina, but Gregory turns her own truism inside out in the razor-sharp comedy <i>Hyacinth Halvey</i>. As an agriculture official (Donal Gallery) arrives into town, with flawless character references under his arm, he discovers a joyless place with no card-playing or dancing. He teams up with a layabout (Liam Heslin) to destroy his good name and get fired. </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">There is nothing particularly new in this comic pairing of an uptight white-collar worker and an easy-going labourer, but the Molière-like rhythms of classic comedy still satisfy, as Gallery and Heslin excellently surf the miraculous plot reversals and impeccably suspended resolutions. </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">This gleeful farce is a standout when compared with muted comedy devices elsewhere, and the overwhelming acridness of <i>McDonough’s Wife</i>, all which suggests <i>DruidGregory</i> is uncertain how to balance its different tones. To ease transitions, Lady Gregory herself appears, in Marie Mullen’s striking resemblance, but as nothing more than an usher leading us between plays. It gives the effect of a historical figure made flesh more so than a character of intrigue, of pageantry more so than art. </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">There is a compelling idea in concluding with <i>Cathleen Ní Houlihan</i>, co-written by W.B. Yeats, and tracing the community divisions seen throughout the plays back to the United Irishmen Rebellion. Here, Mullen has the difficult task of playing a symbol, an old woman enchanting a young man while the countryside takes up arms. If darker inflections have a surprisingly low-impact, leaving the revival feeling tatty, it may be because <i>DruidGregory</i> doesn’t always turn up the volume on the required music. </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif;"><i><span style="font-size: large;">Run ended. On tour until 17th October.</span></i></span></div></div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br />Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-709278040584062582020-09-11T05:23:00.000-07:002020-09-11T05:23:49.980-07:00Transmission review: Crucial moments captured beautifully in the passing light <p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzzc-lp-wYmZKCFJQ8LAnXk8jmyYG8zK0rZh4VTMJNw3MZKpSIwv8uc6yLflRqZJKoOoIxVCyZTCKqcuKfvCMgQ4fyEPJxAZ4MRMsjnPLSD-aWrTNtpmKUtFx_DFUHnwcTilpxUeSpfjX4/s1431/TRANSMISSION+%255BLIGHT%255D+LITTLE+WOLF+Credit+Jason+Byrne.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="952" data-original-width="1431" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzzc-lp-wYmZKCFJQ8LAnXk8jmyYG8zK0rZh4VTMJNw3MZKpSIwv8uc6yLflRqZJKoOoIxVCyZTCKqcuKfvCMgQ4fyEPJxAZ4MRMsjnPLSD-aWrTNtpmKUtFx_DFUHnwcTilpxUeSpfjX4/w400-h266/TRANSMISSION+%255BLIGHT%255D+LITTLE+WOLF+Credit+Jason+Byrne.JPG" width="400" /></a></div><span style="color: #999999;">Caitríona Ní Mhurchú tries to live in the present in her new play, but her family's history holds fascinating surprises. Photo: Jason Byrne </span></div><p></p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><b style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><span><a name='more'></a></span>Abbey Theatre - Peacock Stage, Dublin Fringe Festival</b></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><b>★ </b></span><b style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">★</b><span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif;"><b><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></b></span></span><span style="background-color: transparent;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif;"><b><span style="font-size: large;">★ ★</span> </b></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both;"><span style="background-color: transparent;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif;"><b><br /></b></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">It’s true that nothing lasts forever. But lately there’s been a resurgence in analogue technologies, in putting your hand on something tangible in a digital world. (I got some new vinyl. Come over and listen). </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">In <i>Transmission</i> - Caitríona Ní Mhurchú’s superb new solo play for Little Wolf - there’s a lot of old tech. Caitríona begins explaining her concerns with the obsessive nature of nostalgia and how it stops people from living in the present. She discards tape cassettes into a bin, the main records of her career as a continuity announcer for RTÉ in the 1990s. They were the days when someone appeared onscreen between TV shows and gave an enigmatic synopsis of an upcoming film from an armchair. Alas, we only hear their voice nowadays. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">There are chunks of time theory here that could easily be indigestible. In fact Ní Mhurchú’s 2014 play <i>Eating Seals and Seagulls’s Eggs</i>, an old-tech biography of Peig Sawyers where cassette tape was scattered like Blasket Island seaweed, tried to say too much too acridly. But here Ní Mhurchú and director Gina Moxley find arch conceits for the tension between moments saved and those threatened to vanish forever. For instance, Caitríona’s mother is played by a vacuum robot who bleeps every time her daughter throws another precious memory away! </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">As she de-clutters her life, Caitríona reflects on the events that led to her TV career. Andy Warhol’s claim that everyone will be “world-famous for fifteen minutes” has been disputed to originate from the photographer Nat Finkelstein, she says, but it wouldn’t have been immortalised if it didn’t come from Warhol’s lips. Curious about the point of origin of her own life, she traces history back to her great-grandfather who was a lighthouse keeper, another profession that seems to have stayed in the last century. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">Moxley and designer Sarah Jane Shiels seize the opportunity to shine, so to speak. There’s a fantastic scene where the lighthouse keeper becomes the last onshore witness to the Titanic before it sinks. Against Jason Byrne’s elegant video visuals, the lighthouse beam freezes like a final snapshot of the ship, the last comforting beacon for its passengers. Beeps and signals impressively stir to life, tapping out “SOS”. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">Clocks tick slower the closer they are to sea level. As Caitríona details the passing on of recorded stories and kept mementos throughout the generations of her family, moments in time are fascinatingly unlocked and magnified.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">What’s most touching is the chronology that forms. Whether it’s the light-bending power of a lighthouse’s guiding beacon, of a continuity announcer’s goodnight message on television, and, finally, of a play’s transmission to its audience, these are crucial moments captured beautifully.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><i>Runs until 12th September.</i></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span></div></div>Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-48771436464314586762020-09-09T15:43:00.003-07:002020-09-09T15:44:43.630-07:00Before You Say Anything review: Multiple stories forced into an elegant flawed play<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-IF7jh7imaqpb2l8Nkag6yG4QBeQjqtqQrFMnp-kbuyzHEzeiq9tH2mQBzK3lkMmE7_NmsxHpwFzVmEXm9PNc6KA7Ijhd4aY_JE614QBwrUHdCXlSGbUBGEEEtkiCDR6Cw4O9m-movYNw/s2000/Before+You+Say+Anything%252C+Dublin+Fringe+Festival+2020.+Photo+Simon+Lazewksi+10.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1333" data-original-width="2000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-IF7jh7imaqpb2l8Nkag6yG4QBeQjqtqQrFMnp-kbuyzHEzeiq9tH2mQBzK3lkMmE7_NmsxHpwFzVmEXm9PNc6KA7Ijhd4aY_JE614QBwrUHdCXlSGbUBGEEEtkiCDR6Cw4O9m-movYNw/w400-h266/Before+You+Say+Anything%252C+Dublin+Fringe+Festival+2020.+Photo+Simon+Lazewksi+10.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999;">Three seemingly unrelated stories about people unsafe from the police merge in Malaprop's new play. Photo: Simon Lazewksi</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span><a name='more'></a></span><span style="color: #999999;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><b style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">Dublin Castle - Chapel Royal, Dublin Fringe Festival</b></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><b>★ </b></span><b style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">★</b><span style="background-color: transparent;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: medium;"><b> </b></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">Compact enough for a single sitting, and meticulously constructed towards a desired effect, a play and a short story might have some things in common. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">In a recent interview Claire O’Reilly, director of Malaprop’s new play <i>Before You Say Anything</i>, spoke about the nature of short stories, how they can combine age-old desires for understanding where we come from with the jolt of contemporary life and its anxieties. That brilliantly sums up Malaprop’s excellent 2017 play <i>Everything Not Saved</i>, which didn’t resemble a short story but an anthology. It featured three stories about performers that seemed at first unrelated but began to subtly speak to each other, one actor’s tale of self-invention bouncing off another’s meditation on posterity, finishing with a stunning episode that had been floating in the background about Maria Rasputin as a circus performer in 1920s Berlin. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">Playwright Dylan Coburn Gray and the company use this elegant structure again in <i>Before You Say Anything</i>, though proceedings feel a lot more signposted. Setting a heavy tone of unrest, a woman arrives into the Chapel Royal dressed in black (Maeve O’Mahony), singing a song with a liturgical melody: “Inside my head there is a universe ... There’s no room for me because of what you did”. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">This haunting weightiness quickly gets replaced by a completely different energy, an aristocrat arriving butt naked (Peter Corboy), fleeing from a situation where he could have been exposed as gay. It is 1890s London, the same moment as Oscar Wilde’s trial, and Corboy’s man hungrily gossips about past dalliances. His mood darkens as he talks about the dangers of being arrested on suspicion, of having no right to due process. But in an irreverent, exaggerated reality like an R-rated comedy of manners, this sincerity is a hard sell. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">It's an irony between centuries when Corboy disappears as a gay playboy in one story and reappears as a priest in the next. The second story is set in 1980s London, and sees a black woman arriving naked in a church (Ghaliah Conroy), escaping her abusive husband. The priest gives her clothes from a donation box and tries to help while the police make racist assumptions about her being a prostitute. The scene bubbles with intrigue but surprisingly falls flat, eliciting a tonne of exposition from Corboy’s priest without any compelling tension. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">There is a satisfying ping in the brain when subtle cues make connections between separate components. But <i>Before You Say Anything</i> insists heavily on the links between its stories, as director O’Reilly and designer Molly O’Cathain send dramatic atmospherics through them with the surge of Suzie Cummins’s lighting, the electro-pop of Jennifer O’Malley’s music, and the impressive movement of Ghaliah Conroy’s choreography. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">There is an arch play in here somewhere about people being unsafe from the peacekeepers, building as it does to the funeral of journalist Dara Quigley whose privacy was woefully betrayed by police. That a gay man and a black woman are seen as the faces of the same police force might say something about complicity, it might say something about the erasure of law enforcement history, or it might suggest that this story anthology could have done with another edit. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><i>Runs until 11th September.</i></span></div></div>Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-875239472991656772020-09-07T15:47:00.001-07:002020-09-07T15:47:53.504-07:00Will I See You There review: Eavesdropping on a touching reunion in a city square <p></p><div style="text-align: center;"> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_to3PGZmMoJAIxTcVvXr49-ihvcHWmZML5DbdilIdrea7Modh_hRXjij6uI1Js2hRpuKw-1-XTzR7RLiU1J8Sz6gXfSowzhHTxBpEXvnNr6eTFGx13oaihPdH2XaSGzaNNqxiulwg7Tyr/s2048/WISYT_4.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1243" data-original-width="2048" height="243" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_to3PGZmMoJAIxTcVvXr49-ihvcHWmZML5DbdilIdrea7Modh_hRXjij6uI1Js2hRpuKw-1-XTzR7RLiU1J8Sz6gXfSowzhHTxBpEXvnNr6eTFGx13oaihPdH2XaSGzaNNqxiulwg7Tyr/w400-h243/WISYT_4.JPG" width="400" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999;">In this slick play-installation, the audience peers down from above and listens to a chance encounter between friends through headphones. </span></div><br /><p></p><div style="background-color: black; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><b style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><span><a name='more'></a></span>Gallery of Photography, Dublin Fringe Festival</b></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><b>★ </b></span><b style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">★ </b><b style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">★ </b><span style="background-color: transparent;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: medium;"><b>★ </b></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both;"><span style="background-color: transparent;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: medium;"><b><br /></b></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">The ground tiles in Meeting House Square alternate between white and grey like a plastic chequerboard. For passers-by it is a sanctuary from busy Dublin streets, a place where shoppers sit on benches and slabs of contemporary design attract skateboarders. On one side of the square a popular Italian eatery hums with diners sitting outside. On the opposite side a vacant restaurant site sits neglected and empty like a defeated dream, tagged with graffiti. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">In <i>Will I See You There</i>, the new installation-play by Murmuration, Meeting House Square kind of feels like a three-dimensional artwork. Its audience gathers in a room high above the square and peers down through a window. There are moments when the ambience of Jennifer O’Malley’s excellent sound design creates an evocative backdrop, replacing the everyday grit of the city with the bright fluidity of a dream. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">Playwright James Elliott’s follow-up to <i>Summertime </i>- another drama viewed from a distance - is a slick work of broad imagination. The faraway actors aren't only synced up with dialogue heard through the audience’s headphones but also abstract internal thoughts. “Cut adrift,” says Dee (Nessa Matthews) with a reciting tone, before walking into the square and awkwardly catching the eye of her old friend Fin (Finbarr Doyle) sitting nearby. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">A funny, excruciating reunion follows, with both parties poking fun at old memories while skirting cautiously around unsaid feelings. Dee has been living in Berlin with her girlfriend for several years, and resents that her return hasn’t attracted more attention. In a stealthy comic performance, Doyle’s Fin shrinks away from her questions, agonising with face-scrunches that are big enough to be seen from far away without pulling us into a broader comedy. All the while, internal panics (“Why would you say that?!”) give external dialogue a nice electrical charge. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">The square isn’t just an urban refuge in director John King’s meticulous production. As the plot steers towards the friends’ last encounter, a random phone call in the middle of the night from the streets of Berlin, Matthews’ Dee paces the square as if drawn in by the pull of recollection, floating across a memory-scape where a closed down restaurant isn’t the only symbol of decay. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">Murmuration knows that in art, no less than in life, eavesdropping is a way to pick up on what we miss. Digging through the layers of this touching reunion, we discover a crushing misconnection, a cry for help that was made but quickly got lost in the Dublin din. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><i>Runs until 9th September. </i></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div></div>Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-35816258113184852982020-09-06T10:39:00.001-07:002020-09-06T12:08:46.988-07:00Token Cis review: Some shakily constructed jokes but this comedy material is gold <p></p><div style="text-align: center;"> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6Va9Ey03ZaiunHj9G_Pj8rUxFAFcsAYt1yri7Ciw7xl3a16cdsBQKws3fNiQGZDEj5HvlOfocMi3nUXdSiW0jE7XOsfG0nhuPHs7tPpNHN42Fym1VPg3lm4v2bNXAG4cuGuQOCr01uNOg/s1600/IMG-20200906-WA0010.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6Va9Ey03ZaiunHj9G_Pj8rUxFAFcsAYt1yri7Ciw7xl3a16cdsBQKws3fNiQGZDEj5HvlOfocMi3nUXdSiW0jE7XOsfG0nhuPHs7tPpNHN42Fym1VPg3lm4v2bNXAG4cuGuQOCr01uNOg/w400-h300/IMG-20200906-WA0010.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999;">Alive to empty symbols of effort, the main parody by this comedy troupe is to give stage time to guest cisgender comics as if they're doing them a favour. <span style="text-align: left;">Photo: </span><span style="text-align: left;">Shubhangi Karmakar</span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999;"><span style="text-align: left;"><br /></span></span></div><span><a name='more'></a></span><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b style="background-color: black; color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">Project Arts Centre - Upstairs, Dublin Fringe Festival</b></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><b>★ </b></span><b style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">★ </b><b style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">★ </b></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><b style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">“I’m not surprised an audience turned up. Us queers are good at withstanding viruses with little help from the government,” says Allie O’Rourke, the blistering MC of <i>Token Cis</i>. This sharp comedy show - a blend of five different stand-up routines - delivers a number of eloquent takedowns of discriminatory establishments, as if breathing new life into the theory that if comedy doesn’t contain displaced anger, it won’t be funny. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">Sparked by a disagreement with a comedy producer who said there aren’t enough queer comics to warrant a monthly comedy night, Token Straight is a collective featuring comedians Allie O’Rourke, Felix O’Connor, MJ Stokes and Neil Farrell. Alive to empty symbols of effort, the main parody in their comedy is to give stage time to straight comics as if they are doing them a favour. In <i>Token Cis</i> the idea is evolved further to give cisgender guests a platform, allowing the show to be inclusive to other emerging queer comics without losing its subversive edge. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">This is a breath of fresh air, especially when the usual comedy line-up at the Dublin Fringe Festival doesn’t look possible anymore. In 2017 four performers including Conor O’Toole accused Al Porter of sexual misconduct. This year Davey Reilly admitted to claims of emotional abuse, the improv-comedy troupe Dreamgun announced the removal of a member following stories of inappropriate behaviour, and Ruth Hunter quit being a comedian due to the toxicity of the industry. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><i>Token Cis</i> feels like a fresh slate, an exciting introduction to bright new comics whose anger is justified, their material original, if the construction of some jokes a little bit shaky. There’s a point when the charming Felix O’Connor, vibrating with adrenaline, compares a friend’s visit to the film <i>Get Out</i> as they stumble into Felix’s weird, tight-lipped household, mistaking old photos of him for a murdered family member. It’s a skit rich with new ideas, revealing silly awkwardness around transitions and easily mistaken identities, but it lacks a capper to bring the skit to a close. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">There are stretched experiments with callbacks, and some one-liners that don’t quite work. When Allie O’Rourke searches through the irony of having well-endowed male genitalia that she’d rather reconstruct into female genitalia, it seems like an arch attempt to transform the “dick joke,” but alas that symbol of male-dominated comedy is made of harder stuff. Other inventive one-liners do find release, such as O'Rourke’s hilarious anecdote about being misgendered by a camogie coach, and the edgy wit MJ Stokes’s lament of being endlessly compared to Sue Perkins. Elsewhere, the surrealist Neil Farrell weaves in comic poetry and music, exploring the exhausting illogic of alt-right trolls with enough vim to bring the show to a close. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">Saying that the funniest routine belongs to the token cisgender comic Ian Lynam - a neurodiverse humourist, with an excellent sight gag about the myth that bleach cures autism - may invite controversy. But the touching spirit of this show is that comedy can be a team effort. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><i>Run ends September 6th.</i></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><br style="font-size: 13.2px;" /></div></div></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div style="color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><br /></div></div></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: right;"><span style="text-align: left;">f</span></div><p></p>Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-65738805435462754082020-08-23T13:06:00.003-07:002020-08-23T13:16:53.443-07:00The First Pegeen review: Sad forbidden romance in the Celtic Twilight <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifkPkufkHl4oZfkDU45T2eduOLQEiE4OCg9EFzMYnj1AO8pYhz_ApC5OB-5alBwqQGRE6wXTpWYE9h-M1s369Gk3LA8pSwcSj3PCG8d1CLlovx0_kD-G-CDCWxqp7iqpjIcbdJ83MkRwIs/s2048/The+First+Pegeen+%252816%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1345" data-original-width="2048" height="269" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifkPkufkHl4oZfkDU45T2eduOLQEiE4OCg9EFzMYnj1AO8pYhz_ApC5OB-5alBwqQGRE6wXTpWYE9h-M1s369Gk3LA8pSwcSj3PCG8d1CLlovx0_kD-G-CDCWxqp7iqpjIcbdJ83MkRwIs/w410-h269/The+First+Pegeen+%252816%2529.jpg" width="410" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999;">In this biographical drama about the Abbey Theatre star, Molly Allgood attends the funeral of her lover John Millington Synge from a distance. Photo: Futoshi Sakauchi</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><span><a name='more'></a></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px; text-align: left;"><span face="" style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><b>Bewley's Café Theatre @ The Irish Georgian Society, Dublin</b></span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; text-align: left;"><span face="" style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><b>★ </b></span><b style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">★ </b><b style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">★ </b><b style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">★ </b></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; text-align: left;"><b style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; text-align: start;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; color: white; font-family: georgia, utopia, "palatino linotype", palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px; text-align: left;"><span face="" style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">In John Millington Synge’s <i>The Playboy of the Western World</i> the bright, acerbic bartender Pegeen Mike isn’t one to be fooled for long. Trapped in a wasteland version of Mayo, surrounded by idiots, she eventually sees through the attractive lies spun by a beloved visitor from out of town. If you’re to believe the body-swapping terms use to describe the art of acting, how an actor “steps into the shoes of someone else,” then the actor who originated the role of Pegeen Mike was no fool either. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span face="" style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span face="" style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><i>The First Pegeen</i>, Bewley’s Café Theatre’s biographical drama about the Abbey Theatre star Molly Allgood, could easily be a lunchtime play full of historical interest and little else. An opportunity to see run-ins with the celebrities of the Celtic Twilight. Instead, George O’Brien’s script tells a story that is more intimate, largely revolving around Molly and her dying fiancé John Millington Synge.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span face="" style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span face="" style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">On the day of John’s funeral, Molly (Aisling O’Mara) watches the burial from a distance. She does fiendish impersonations of the mourners in attendance - including Lady Gregory and Molly’s actor sister Sara Allgood - as uptight, conservative and easily scandalised by the thought of a city centre-raised Catholic showing up at the graveside of her aristocratic Protestant lover. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span face="" style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span face="" style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">The play allows O’Mara’s Molly to poke fun at such puritans, to ridicule family and contemporaries. But most complex and frustrating is John himself, whose idea of a romantic gesture is a chilling forest walk.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span face="" style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span face="" style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">This daft contradiction is brilliantly played up by O’Mara, whose Molly desires greater comforts and excellence, to leave the bleak plays of the Abbey Theatre for the elegant worlds of Shakespeare and Bernard Shaw. A popular, outgoing figure easily rousing the jealousies of her stoic partner, these are the zingy flavours of a romantic drama. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span face="" style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span face="" style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">Having scoured historical sources, O’Brien’s script fits in a lot of cameos from the Abbey Theatre’s early years, so much so that parts of it can read like entries from an encyclopaedia. But the play doesn’t lose focus of its most important characters. In one gorgeous scene John’s mother, a frosty picture of disapproval, melts into a friendly mother-in-law to be. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span face="" style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span face="" style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">Director Michael James Ford’s supple production is similarly changeable, a fun satire of disapproving prudes that can also approach tender scenes at a dying man’s sickbed.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span face="" style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span face="" style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">Towards the end Molly, her future family sadly gone, turns to preparing John’s final play <i>Deirdre of the Sorrows</i> for production, its intensely romantic lines read aloud with fresh meaning. You can’t experience sorrow without knowing the joy that’s out there. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span face="" style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span face="" style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span face="" style="color: white; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><i>Until Aug 29th. </i></span></div></div></div></div></div><p></p>Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-83653201178175501762020-08-17T14:03:00.002-07:002020-08-17T14:03:32.712-07:00Solar Bones review: Experimental novel adapted into absurdly random ghost story<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgid3agLrHUYsSzh-K75bzYwO30jnIfkkeMowe8l5Gk45pJcVAyuiW6V7HxTIY6f1VHpNx_za7cmjE3MXVAvW4dlj2mUsc0BgBazdWv19_Fy_i0x2xFCfzfUSyHO_4nlAS-jYw_6Oma_VV/s2048/Stanley+Townsend+in+Solar+Bones+photo+c+Ste+Murray.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1283" data-original-width="2048" height="257" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgid3agLrHUYsSzh-K75bzYwO30jnIfkkeMowe8l5Gk45pJcVAyuiW6V7HxTIY6f1VHpNx_za7cmjE3MXVAvW4dlj2mUsc0BgBazdWv19_Fy_i0x2xFCfzfUSyHO_4nlAS-jYw_6Oma_VV/w410-h257/Stanley+Townsend+in+Solar+Bones+photo+c+Ste+Murray.jpg" width="410" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999;">Mike McCormack's novel sees the ghost of a man return to his home on All Soul's Day. Photo: Ste Murray </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999;"><br /></span></div><span><a name='more'></a></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; color: white; font-family: Georgia, Utopia, "Palatino Linotype", Palatino, serif; font-size: 13.2px; text-align: start;"><span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><b>Watergate Theatre, Kilkenny Arts Festival</b></span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; text-align: start;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b>★ </b></span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; text-align: start;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; text-align: start;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">Things don’t seem quite right in <i>Solar Bones</i>, Kilkenny Arts Festival’s new play in partnership with Rough Magic. I’m not talking about the strange, otherworldly kitchen covered in plastic wrap where our protagonist Marcus (Stanley Townsend), a middle-aged engineer, is confusedly looking for misplaced appliances while trying to recall foggy memories about his family. Rather, the source material - Mike McCormack’s experimental novel written in a single sentence - has had its signals mixed.</span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; text-align: start;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; text-align: start;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">Read the description of the novel <i>Solar Bones</i> on its publisher’s website and the truth about Marcus is revealed straight away. He is no longer alive but in fact a ghost, stepping back into the world on All Soul’s Day. This explanation isn't lost on absolutely anyone, with the exception of Marcus himself. He spends a chunk of Michael West’s adaptation - the blurb for which omits any mention of him being an apparition - wondering what date it is and why things around his house have been moved, unaware that he has died. </span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; text-align: start;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; text-align: start;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">West’s script seems to suspend that realisation not just for Marcus but for the audience as well. The subtle displacement of everyday household items, the sense of lost time when he reads the date on the newspaper, all build a mystery to be solved. Such subtle details may suit a production wedded to underplayed realism but the home in director Lynne Parker’s production is spectral, its translucent plastic surfaces rippling with blue light. It’s disconnecting to see Marcus ponder the slight rearrangement of his house when its construction looks unfinished at the timber frame stage.</span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; text-align: start;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; text-align: start;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">We watch as Marcus’s lucid memories begin to fold in on top of each other. He recalls his father’s skill in fixing machinery, lessons in how design and engineering can prevent chaos and collapse. He revisits his daughter’s art exhibition where he is shocked by her chosen medium (her own blood). During the 2007 Crytosporidium outbreak, he becomes a carer for his wife. A couple who easily bicker - blaming each other for not making a restaurant booking, that kind of thing - rediscover a tenderness between them, in gentle comforts such as falling asleep on the couch. </span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; text-align: start;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; text-align: start;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">The intervention of West’s script is to isolate these threads from the experimental prose, disentangle them from the wildly modernist inheritances of Joyce and Beckett, but what never existed are the prompts for these memories and how they link together. McCormack’s prose is woven from free associations, or even anecdotes that pop up out of the blue. Sitting at the kitchen table, Townsend’s Marcus may complete one story, start thinking seriously in a new direction, and jump into the details of a new unrelated episode. The composition is absurdly random.</span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; text-align: start;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; text-align: start;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">In this disarray, Townsend is actually a marvel. His meticulous performance chooses intonations that aren’t obvious, going in directions you wouldn't expect. He delivers Marcus’s confusion with an enjoyable wryness as he digs into his life. Uncovered joys are given their required uplifts, and sorrows their sad wreckage, especially as the plot heads towards the story of Marcus’s own tragic end.</span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; text-align: start;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; text-align: start;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;">Gather together the cloudy recollections and there is something impressive here. You may find the epic tapestry of Marcus as a son, a father and a husband. A man seen in all his roles. But theatre, like engineering, sometimes gains more than it loses from order and how elements form to make a whole. Otherwise chaos reigns. </span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; text-align: start;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; text-align: start;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="background-color: black; clear: both; text-align: start;"><span style="color: white; font-family: times, times new roman, serif; font-size: large;"><i>Run ended.</i></span></div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div><br /></div></div><p></p>Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-46943097555801955382020-08-09T23:45:00.006-07:002020-08-10T00:08:51.341-07:00The Happy Prince review: Alluring production of Oscar Wilde’s story without the decadent comedown <p style="text-align: right;"><span style="color: #999999; text-align: left;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjISmXBadtwZMFjrniuvJbJjCabqNF1_0lQXk7Vdq4mFm1mZgwEx-Ih1xWkGr7c7yJ6b7DhtjYy4tyQrOz1T4GEYFdfdXwXvSATfTTw-szAQu_hiRXRM05am-YIMb9buI3azVBAfqeXIZbD/s2048/HP+new+fez.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1365" data-original-width="2048" height="274" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjISmXBadtwZMFjrniuvJbJjCabqNF1_0lQXk7Vdq4mFm1mZgwEx-Ih1xWkGr7c7yJ6b7DhtjYy4tyQrOz1T4GEYFdfdXwXvSATfTTw-szAQu_hiRXRM05am-YIMb9buI3azVBAfqeXIZbD/w410-h274/HP+new+fez.jpg" width="410" /></a></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999; text-align: left;"><span style="color: #999999;">The statue of a prince peers into the lives of a city's misfortunate inhabitants, in Oscar Wilde's story for ch</span><span style="color: #999999;">ildren. </span></span></div><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small; text-align: left;"><span style="color: #999999;"><br /></span></span></div><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span><a name='more'></a></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">Bewley's Café Theatre @ the Irish Georgian Society, Dublin</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span face="" style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><b>★ ★ ★</b></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span face="" style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span face="" style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">Bewley’s Café Theatre has been through the mill. Broken fragments of old, decorative stonework lie across its stage. Salvaged columns from a previous era extend to a broken fanlight above, forming a handsomely decrepit proscenium arch. These are either artefacts on display by its temporary venue, the Irish Georgian Society, or the theatre has taken a bruising by having its doors closed by the pandemic. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span face="" style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span face="" style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">There is a more intriguing idea in this decision to revive Michael James Ford’s 2003 adaptation of Oscar Wilde’s story for children, itself a decadent blend of glamour and decline. What could have been a convenient, economic production from the theatre’s repertoire instead seems fittingly chosen for the beautiful, crumbling plasterwork and sculptures of the surroundings.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span face="" style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span face="" style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">The statue of a late prince, after a lifetime of splendid privilege and shunned displays of emotion, stands high on a column. He is a beloved symbol of wealth and beauty, but spends his days peering sadly into the windows of the city’s most impoverished inhabitants. When an adventurous feathered vertebrate Sparrow abandons his warmer climate for this chilly place, he befriends the Happy Prince and they set out to aide those struggling to survive. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span face="" style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span face="" style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">Ford is well aware of this double-act in Wilde’s story. As a narrator resplendent in a black suit and pearlescent bowtie, his attention is to jewel-like intonation while the dynamic shifts in Philip Dodd’s violin music - played by the excellent Denice Doyle - keeps the pace breezy. In other words, this looks like a duet between a sculptural object and a generous song.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span face="" style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span face="" style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">We follow Sparrow as he wings past grand city monuments, carrying valuable gifts from the Happy Prince - the sapphire gems that are his eyes, the gold-leaf that adorns his coat - to children ill and starving. One uplifting scene even sees a hard-working playwright, living in the bitter frost of poverty, receiving a helping hand.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span face="" style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span face="" style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">Such storytelling may glint and sparkle but director Bairbre Ní Chaoimh’s production denies the more stirring ingredients of Wilde’s decadent prose, principally its tragedy. When the story steers towards its sad conclusion, and the fates of the Happy Prince and Sparrow are revealed, there is barely a moment to mourn before the violin sweeps us towards the next plot point. In a tale of self-sacrifice, that’s quite a thing to forfeit </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span face="" style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span face="" style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;">The absence of that comedown could suggest a production that’s all allure and no depth but, in an attempt to give it something new among the stylish ruins of the Irish Georgian Society, <i>The Happy Prince</i> is no museum piece either. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span face="" style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span face="" style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span face="" style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: large;"><i>Runs until Aug 15th.</i></span></div></div>Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-17749945319442078852020-07-09T10:05:00.001-07:002020-07-09T10:14:51.608-07:00Seraglio review: An opera from the lost season reimagined as a daringly modern miniseries <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="color: #999999;">In Irish National Opera's hands, Mozart's orientalist singspiel loses the arabesques and makes the move to lockdown Dublin.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">★ ★ ★ ★</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">It is true that what is ephemeral does not stick around for long. Fans of operas and plays know something about showing up before a window closes, seeing a production before its run is finished. It can feel like caring about something with a short shelf life. We also know a thing or two about the hidden power of years ahead, the possibility of someone new taking back up that script, that libretto, that composition. What is ephemeral can return.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Who knows how many of the postponed productions scheduled for 2020 will return, but they all have surviving blueprints that could lead to their recovery. What has been lost for good, however, is the accidental combination of those productions and the contrast of ideas they would have created, the zeitgeist of hits and misses that would have formed. A season has been lost. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Irish National Opera’s <i>The Abduction from the Seraglio </i>was an anticipated opera from the lost season. Nowadays, the best you might hope from Mozart’s singspiel, a Turkish-inspired orientalist entertainment from 1782, could be a romantic comedy without arabesques, the frolicsome rescue of two women from a Turkish officer’s seraglio (or harem). But the attachment of Caitriona McLaughlin - director of hard-hitting productions like <i>On Rafferty’s Hill</i> and <i>This Hostel Life</i> - and a blurb mentioning sex-trafficking suggested that something more serious was afoot. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The creative team didn’t let go, and now the opera has been reimagined as <i>Seraglio</i>, an online miniseries, new episodes of which are released twice a week. What could have been an attempt to make one of Mozart’s singspiels politically stirring has instead relocated somewhere daringly funny and modern. The mean, dangerous officer and slave-owner Selim (wry conductor Peter Whelan, as serious as a baton) is found in lockdown in his Dublin home, trying to write a children’s story. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Despite the jump to online miniseries, McLaughlin continues to base the production on opera logic. The entirety of the first episode is dedicated to the overture. Selim retreats into his imagination and envisions an orchestra (the excellent Irish Chamber Orchestra players) playing a musical piece that starts quietly, before being interrupted by loud passages of military-like music. Through a spectacular feat of conducting, we watch musicians in their separate homes playing together, eventually unifying onscreen as one miraculous ensemble. The Irish Chamber Orchestra, no less than <i>Seraglio</i>, has learned to be flexible. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Lift the lid off Mozart’s orientalism and it would smell strongly, but there’s a sense of it being comically suppressed in McLaughlin’s subversive production. An outline of Moorish architecture in the opening sequence extends into the arches of the Ha’penny Bridge. Selim keeps his would-be captives in a WhatsApp group called “Abducted Amigos,” (hahaha!) and is tempted during his Ramadan fast by a Turkish Delight chocolate bar. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The plot begins to move in the second episode, with the kind of lovelorn yearning that shows characters staring longingly at Tinder. T</span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">he stoic Selim gets lost in the profile of his friend Kanstanze (Claudia Boyle), as the storylines of a romantic comedy unfold, but not without an off-the-wall bloodlust. In a fun, deranged aria, </span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Wojtek Gierlach’s jealous security guard Osmin swears to behead, hang and skewer the South Dublin footballer photographed with the love of his life. Now that’s the kind of savage barbarianism I can get behind. </span><br />
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Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-59485583001252907662020-07-03T09:53:00.000-07:002020-07-03T09:53:09.344-07:00Binge review: A gleeful performance installation on Zoom where treasured television shows hold life’s answers <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7B2hYGtUm1xRv3T5a68OL8ZO6RHwDR-2l4alqiiV8-1U-rbmyVmkr129Nd4ZX7BfFoEFxVQxXbCi8SSNARbDfcY5_u77Y6R3UMtJibzrydrNWxk_oYzbt_CEs-FSKsigqaD7KBWWJ5TEe/s1600/BrianLobel-BINGE-by-Christa-Holka-30Jun20-092.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="542" data-original-width="707" height="306" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7B2hYGtUm1xRv3T5a68OL8ZO6RHwDR-2l4alqiiV8-1U-rbmyVmkr129Nd4ZX7BfFoEFxVQxXbCi8SSNARbDfcY5_u77Y6R3UMtJibzrydrNWxk_oYzbt_CEs-FSKsigqaD7KBWWJ5TEe/s400/BrianLobel-BINGE-by-Christa-Holka-30Jun20-092.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="color: #999999;">This interactive performance, presented by Cork Midsummer Festival, makes reassuring parallels between the audience's stories and the lives of fictional television characters. Photo: Christa Holka</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">★ ★ ★ ★</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">It is shocking that the New York-born Brian Lobel, wild of hair, dressed leisurely in a robe, comes across less than a stage persona and more like a fellow citizen. In his one-on-one, performance installation <i>Binge</i> for the La Jolla Playhouse, presented by Cork Midsummer Festival, he floats through his London apartment, eliciting my solitary thoughts with effortless charm while simultaneously parsing storylines from <i>Sex and the City</i>. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">This combination of gentle assurance and specialist knowledge made Lobel known as the creator of the moving <i>You Have to Forgive Me</i>, a durational performance where he got into bed with audiences and watched chosen episodes of that comedy-drama about emotionally complex Manhattanites. <i>Binge</i> has been adapted for Zoom, so it doesn’t carry the same intimacy, but it does intriguingly extend the formula to a wider cast and other franchises. You might get a different performer making reassuring parallels between your life and characters from <i>Queer as Folk</i> or, if you're lucky, <i>The Real Housewives</i>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Television shows hold life’s answers in this gleeful interactive performance. Can a return to chosen treasures bring out new, fresh meanings? If, like Lobel, you once shouted at anti-heroine Carrie Bradshaw for pleading to a betrayed ex-boyfriend, only years later to shed tears during the same scene, you might have gained new scars.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Most of what happens is woven from your own stories and opinions. There is a comprehensive survey to be filled out beforehand, where questions appealing to cult followers of <i>Star Trek</i>, <i>Gilmore Girls</i> and other shows are designed to extract your personal thoughts. The resulting performance may make you feel like an agent rather than a witness, more a participant than an audience. Who’s Zoomin’ whom here exactly? </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">This collusion can make the performance feel all about us, the audience, but there is a longer con here. References from <i>Sex and the City</i> drift into Lobel’s apartment. There is a reach for a martini glass, a lip-sync to a song from an iconic scene. He is unafraid of comic, risqué touches as he guides the performance. (I’m not entirely sure how to respond when a man in a robe says: “I want us to do some role play”). </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">With his encyclopaedic knowledge, he instantly summons references from key episodes, weaving Bradshavian parallels to my revealed anxieties about the Dublin property market and being single. As the performance’s coda - a monologue from the show - near-miraculously sums up a lot that is said, while also offering new advice, it’s clear that <i>Binge </i>isn’t about me after all. It is about art and its radical comforts. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><i>Runs until July 12th. See corkmidsummer.com </i></span><br />
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Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-41474301740392493992020-06-24T11:50:00.000-07:002020-06-24T11:50:18.772-07:00Ulysses review: RTÉ’s staggering 29½-hour radio play of James Joyce’s wild gibberish novel<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="color: #999999;">In Joyce's story, Leopold Bloom navigates an unhappy marriage and Stephen Dedalus searches to elevate everyday heartache into epic poetry</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">★ ★ ★</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: large;">Somewhere on Sandymount Strand, after a day agonising over his wife’s extramarital affair, Leopold Bloom’s thoughts ebb back to his sweet, early days with Molly Bloom. “Longest way round is the shortest way home,” he thinks, their history opened like a new discovery. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">That adage might also summarise <i>Ulysses</i>, a modernist novel so gargantuan with detail, its author once joked it could rebuild Dublin if it were ever demolished. The RTÉ Players' radio adaptation from 1982, rebroadcasted as part of the Bloomsday Festival, comes in at a staggering 29½ hours. Only the adventure drama <i>Moon Over Morocco</i>, from New York’s prestige on-air playhouse ZBS, might come within spitting distance with its 10-hour running time.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">This really is a time-capsule. Directed by William Styles (an acolyte of Hilton Edwards), the production is woven by experienced, crystal-cut voices. Patrick Dawson’s scholarly Stephen Dedalus prepares to give a lecture on <i>Hamlet</i> at the National Library but, in his echoey interior thoughts, he is preoccupied with the ghost of his recently dead mother. “History is a nightmare from which I am trying to escape,” he says. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Stephen isn’t the only one </span><span style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: large;">anxious for an escape, as several characters scramble to rewrite Ireland’s past and plan its future. We get an Anglophile headmaster claiming the Orange Order attempted to repeal the Act of Union. Stephen’s anti-clerical enemy Buck Mulligan intends to “hellenise” the island. Most stark are the anti-Semitic remarks endured by Bloom (Ronnie Walsh, lilting towards the character's Hungarian background), silently taking abuse from others, before taking a stand against his gruesome barroom attacker, The Citizen. “A nation is the same people living in the same place,” says Bloom, with touching courage.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Styles’s production is similarly cosmopolitan, its Dublin tinted with shades of otherworldly places, of Homer’s Greece and Shakespeare’s Elsinore. How it - or any adaptation - can accommodate Joyce’s wild literary experiments is another story. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">The word-by-word adaptation, guided by text consultant Roland McHugh, sounds a sureness of voice through the gibberish. But how the devil to you deliver the stream-of-consciousness wanderings of the “Proteus” episode (an unfocused saunter down Sandymount Strand), the stacked parodies of “Oxen of the Sun” (a drunken, incoherent bender at a maternity hospital) and the ceaseless third-person narration in some parts? The radio play becomes as impassable as a brick wall.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">It’s no surprise that the “Circe” episode, presented in the novel as a playscript, is the most dynamic outing here. The action in these epic, twilit hours in Monto brothels takes place between reality and illusion, through hallucinations of court trials and historic wars, accumulating in a moment where Dublin itself gets blown to pieces. But it’s the protective Bloom, swooping in to save a beaten Stephen, which leaves the biggest impact. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">The unfortunate thing about Joyce’s abstraction is that it too often washes out the contrasting shades of Bloom and Stephen, one’s thought-out navigation through an unhappy marriage, the other’s search to elevate everyday heartache into epic poetry. Both lose their distinct voice, subordinated instead to experimental literary forms. Extracting and separating them, in the words of Bloom’s grandfather (a welcome Christopher Casson), makes your “brain go snap”. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">A saving catch is made by Styles’s decision to punctuate the final, freewheeling “Penelope” episode, giving Pegg Monaghan’s raspy Molly Bloom a coherent finale. Laying bare the entirety of her marriage, its disappointments and rekindled sparks, the achievement seems to be that of <i>Ulysses</i> itself, distilling vast, epic history and containing it within a single story. </span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Available at rte.ie/ulysses</span><span style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: large;">.</span></i></div>
Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-87815988344146543352020-06-11T08:47:00.002-07:002020-06-11T09:04:36.040-07:00Exotic v. Baskin review: An operatic riff on a trashy pleasure struggles to tame its subjects<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="color: #999999;">Carlow Arts Festival's <i>Tiger King</i>-inspired opera sees a showdown between zookeeper Joe Exotic and animal conservationist Carole Baskin. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Bask in the presence of a great showman whose attraction to dangerous creatures has held people’s attention far and wide. After years spent working various jobs, he finds a genius talent for putting living things in cages and charging people money to see them. Self-aware and calculating, he prepares his next performance, presenting to his audience the exact version of himself he wants to be seen. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Ladies and gentleman, say hello to Louis Lovett. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">That synopsis shouldn’t be compared with Joe Exotic, the convicted zookeeper who’s become the icon of a true-crime television series, and now the inspiration for Carlow Arts Festival’s short opera <i>Exotic v. Baskin</i>. Rather, Lovett - a visionary director and actor who gave us captivity dramas such as <i>Hansel and Gretel</i> and <i>FRNKNSTN</i> - is the host of the festival’s live broadcast. Lovett plays a vapid, silly theatre critic named Villum Harsch who introduces the broadcast's productions while puffing on a pipe and blowing smoke - in more ways than one. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">After some of Villum’s empty-headed critical takes, we get to Dana Kaufman’s short opera. The real-life feud between Exotic and the animal conservationist Carole Baskin campaigning to shut down his zoo - a story of animal abuse, tragedy and attempted murder - was recently portrayed as an enjoyably trash kaleidoscope of bad haircuts and propaganda spin by Eric Goode and Rebecca Chailkin’s docuseries <i>Tiger King</i>. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The mythical status of both individuals now fits the broader canvass of opera buffa. “Hey all you cool cats and kittens,” says Ariana Lucas’s Baskin, recording a campaign video wearing pale theatrical make-up and a flower crown. She’s quickly interrupted by a broadcast of Exotic - a gun-bearing, deranged Lucia Lucas - threatening violence against her. The subversive libretto by Tom Swift has Exotic sing the last syllable of his name over and over, like a time bomb ticking down. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The short production - only four minutes long - is directed by its cast with inventive use of video-call backgrounds. Mixed footage contrasts between Exotic’s terrifying zoo compound and Baskin’s New Age animal sanctuary. Similarly, Kauffman’s composition has fun tonal shifts, from the dramatic build-up of Exotic’s threatening comments to the saccharine music of Baskin’s cultish address to her followers. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">If <i>Tiger King</i> ultimately sided with Exotic, through some choice editing that suggested Baskin had a criminal hand in her husband’s disappearance, then Kaufman’s opera shows signs of standing up for Baskin. “The press are so dramatic,” she says, as the music spirals darkly to imagery of tigers eating flesh. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The operatic riff struggles to tame its subjects though. The promised showdown between Exotic and Baskin disappointingly gives in to a song and dance through a field, with each admitting how the other completes them. It may very well belie the slipperiness of the matter. When dealing with someone as in control of their story as Joe Exotic - testimonial footage about his life was destroyed in a mysterious fire - it isn’t easy to land satirical jabs that sting. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Even our festival host Villum isn’t quite the send-up you’d hope for, as a supposedly wicked art critic holding a grudge after failing as an artist. “I learned that it pays to be harsh,” he says, rather benignly. Whether a devil or an angel, the days of being well paid are gone I'm afraid.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><i>Carlow Arts Festival's broadcast is available to view on the festival's YouTube and Facebook pages until 13th June. </i></span><br />
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Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-25615491041767923692020-06-04T11:29:00.000-07:002020-06-04T11:29:12.427-07:00Black Lives Matter protests: Irish theatre has blindfolded itself to race<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="color: #999999;"><i>Boy Child</i>, Felispeak's swooning spoken word drama about a man's coming of age in Nigeria, is one play that has felt like a drop in the ocean in recent years. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: large;">Last year during a talk at New York’s Public Theatre, the director Oskar Eustis alluded to a Broadway play he took issue with. “It posits that in a small Southern town in the ’50s or early ’60s that the top lawyer in town, the top judge in town and the white sheriff in town are all unbelievably enlightened and progressive on the subject of race relations,” he said. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Eustis was obviously speaking of <i>To Kill a Mockingbird</i>, Aaron Sorkin’s acclaimed adaptation of Harper Lee’s novel about a black man wrongly trialled for raping a young white woman. The adaptation turns the story into a neatly honed survey of white saviours and racists, the educated legal professionals and the “white trash” mob. Sorkin’s portrait of the lawyer Atticus Finch is so unquestioned and lettered, it fully ignores Lee’s complex fleshing out of the character in her antecedent novel <i>Go Set a Watchman</i>, which uncovers the extent of his racism.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">In her tremendous theatre review for the culture website The Undefeated, Soraya Nadia McDonald sees Sorkin’s <i>Mockingbird</i> stuck in the comforting lie that racism can be blamed on a select group of cartoonishly evil characters. These “TROT” characters (Those Racists Over There) are used to set up other white characters to be noble rescuers, your racist Bob Ewell to be defeated by your Atticus Finch. It does good at the box office but it creates the illusion that racism can be blamed solely on impoverished white people, when - as Lee alluded - it is insidiously everywhere.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">There’s a chance that if the pandemic weren’t happening, we might have just had TROTs on the Dublin stage. The Gate Theatre had put a revival of <i>The Little Foxes </i>into production, Lillian Hellman’s drama about a white family of cotton plantation owners in early-century Alabama. Hellman was a communist, and the play is an unsettling anatomy of capitalism, lamenting how one white family takes over a town from the local black community. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Towards the end, the family’s youngest member Alexandra realises she’s been manipulated as part of a business deal to construct a new cotton mill. She confronts her mother about the TROTs’ stranglehold on the town’s black population. “There are people who ate the world and other people who stood around and watched them do it. I’m not going to stand around and watch you do it,” she says. Alexandra’s decision to fight against her family could be a fist-bumping gesture of white allyship, but, in a production where the only actors of colour were cast to play a maid and a porter, it could just come across as another raised glass to a white saviour.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">What does an Irish play that’s not all about white people look like? There seems to be industry-wide anxiety to broach the topic. The mid 2000s saw something of a stretch of prolific plays about characters of colour, a period that gave us the orientalist bombast of Conall Morrison’s Iraq War play <i>The Bacchus of Baghdad</i>, and the confused entangling of a Nigerian asylum seeker in Dublin gang violence in Bisi Bisi Adigun and Roddy Doyle’s version of <i>The Playboy of the Western World</i>. Maybe after seeing these, producers saw good reason to stay away. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Now that reluctance, combined with the unfortunate falling away of companies like Camino De Orula Productions, Arambe Productions and Calypso Productions, has led to a steep drop-off in stories about people of colour on Irish stages. Plays like Felispeak’s swooning spoken word drama <i>Boy Child</i> and Maïa Nunes performance art piece <i>Incantation</i> come around like once-off events, a few drops in the ocean, but they’re afresh with new ideas. The likes of Choy-Ping Clarke-Ng’s arch docudrama <i>Where are You From?</i> and Sahar Ali’s comedy <i>Saharcasm </i>are edgy satires that wittily undercut Irish racists' probings into their lives. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">It’s interesting that while long-established companies stayed away from stories by people of colour, they have come to embrace colourblind casting. The triumphant return of Ruth Negga - the first actor to ascend by playing colourblind roles in Ireland - to play Hamlet at the Gate Theatre symbolises how praised the practice has become. Last year, nearly all the top funded theatre companies cast actors of colour, mostly in colourblind roles.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">This may be a way to include actors of colour but there’s something unresolved about how it also un-sees an actor’s race. It could be a form of absence - a silence even, which, in the days of the Black Lives Matter protests since George Floyd’s death, can seem deeply corrosive. If colourblind casting is the extent of how a theatre industry looks at race, could it be a blindfold stopping artists from looking at the real thing?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">There are advances towards infrastructural change in other fields. Last year broadcasters Ola Majekodunmi and Zainab Boladale established Beyond Representation, a platform celebrating women of colour in Irish media, art and business. The music promoter Emily Shaw uses her organisation Oíche Events to amplify black artists making soul, jazz, reggae and electro-pop. Theatre might yet benefit from a similar outfit. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">We take the power of representation for granted. In <i>This Land</i>, Zithelo Bobby Mthombeni's touching documentary about immigration in Ireland, there’s a scene when Felispeaks recalls an uplifted black person approaching her after a performance of <i>Boy Child</i>. “Now I understand why white people go to theatre. It is so interesting seeing myself being represented on stage,” he said.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">What a privilege this theatre-seeing thing is. </span><br />
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Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-14169947244474720632020-05-28T07:39:00.001-07:002020-05-28T07:39:44.722-07:00Howie the Rookie review: A vivid poignant broadcast from Mark O’Rowe’s Dublin underworld<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="color: #999999;">Glass Mask's streamed theatre production, in conjunction with the Lock Inn, rediscovers the darkness and violence of Mark O'Rowe's breakout play. Photo: Seán Doyle</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: large;">★ ★ ★ ★</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">The last outing for <i>Howie the Rookie</i> - Mark O’Rowe’s excellent, breakout play set in a wild Dublin underworld - was an interesting flashpoint. It was the astounding bravura of Tom Vaughan-Lawlor, in his performance as all the characters, which elevated the seemingly ordinary details to heroic form, as if embodying an epic poem about the city. Without that production, it’s difficult to imagine having plays like <i>Dublin Oldschool</i>, <i>Walk For Me</i> and <i>Sure Look It, Fuck It</i>. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">There is sometimes a drawback to that spoken word lyricism in drama. It paints the city in stunning colours but the plot can easily be left to slacken. Poetic detail comes in at dizzying velocity that’s difficult to take in one sitting. Productions freestyle too much to follow.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Glass Mask’s streamed production, in conjunction with the online venue the Lock Inn, shears some of the poetry previously seen in <i>Howie the Rookie</i> but it has a sharp vividness that cuts deep. Rediscovering the pleasurable contrast between the two central characters - the brawler-for hire Howie and the heavily indebted lothario Rookie - it evokes the mythos surrounding the play’s debut production. If Stephen Jones lives up to the endearing brutishness of Aidan Kelly, then Rex Ryan beams the charming swag of Karl Shiels. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Broadcast live from a black box studio, O’Rowe’s play, written in two interlocking monologues, is ideal for the demands of streamed theatre - aside from the poignant conjuring of busy city streets now emptied by the pandemic. The camera-eye substitutes the face-front address to the audience. The tagging in and out of Jones and Ryan allows for social distancing. Though the play has found physical movement in the past to punctuate its script, Seán Doyle’s restrained cinematography mostly prefers standstill waist-up shots, as if filming a fraught testimonial. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">If the meticulous production gives the play an unhurried pace, that’s because some details of O’Rowe’s blazing tale now deserve closer attention. There’s a scene when Ryan’s Rookie - described by virtually everyone as “handsome,” even his enemies - tries to seduce a woman into loaning him money she saved for her brother’s schooling. “I will teach him the manly things of how to survive in a world of pain,” he barters. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Few artists have shown the stranglehold of that myth than Jones, in his own plays <i>From Eden</i> and <i>Northern Lights</i>. As Howie, he is a suburban wildcat, recruited into a revenge plot against the Rookie. He narrates the story’s best comic set pieces, including a tearaway van that skids crazily through the city. The revelation is the shift of focus to more intimate thoughts, such as being turned down by a woman in a bar, and the slow staggering through confusion, the rejection ready to explode. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Even some of the fight scenes, such as a breakneck chase down an alleyway, have an unrushed, darker attention to detail. It’s one thing to race with the music of O’Rowe’s play, to be caught up in the sweep of an epic poem, but here it is deliberately grounded, and not just because of the limits of live theatre during lockdown. The telling feels urgent, as if Dublin were still on the brink. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><i>Runs until Jun 10th. See thelockinn.io/howie</i></span>Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-61334976168306316222020-05-14T03:57:00.000-07:002020-05-14T04:01:51.607-07:00Coronavirus arts measures: The Culture Ministry is a carriage waiting to turn into a pumpkin<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="color: #999999;">Bewley's Café Theatre is the first venue to be seriously impacted by the pandemic. Photo: Bewley's</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Earlier this year, during arts hustings for the general election, Culture Minister Josepha Madigan was asked to defend her department’s arts spending. Research by the National Campaign for the Arts in recent years has shown that Ireland’s culture investment is the lowest in Europe.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">“The arts are the Cinderella at the table, and to secure any funding in that context was extremely difficult,” she said. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">It was a telling insight that confirmed what many suspected. The cabinet table views arts and culture as frivolous, grounded in unreality, its workers not engaging in “real” work. A Culture Minister might make a fool of themself by challenging budgetary decisions by the Department of Finance, for highlighting how meagre the culture spending is compared to the European average. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Since the beginning of the pandemic, the Culture Minister has allocated €500,000 in arts measures - in the bizarre form of digital art bursaries, not in supports for COVID-impacted institutions and workers to recover their losses. The National Campaign for the Arts quickly admonished the move, saying the measures don’t acknowledge the financial damage done to professional practice. The Campaign called for the establishment of a stabilisation fund, and an additional €20m investment in the Arts Council in 2020. That was over a month ago, and not an extra cent has been spent.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The arts measures in Ireland have been oblivious to those introduced elsewhere. A few days after that press conference, the Culture Minister posted a photo on Twitter of herself attending a video meeting with other culture ministers in the European Union. “I proposed ring-fencing a percentage of funding introduced to fight COVID-19 for the cultural and creative sector,” she said. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">It’s awkward to imagine the Culture Minister sharing an update about her €500,000 investment during that meeting. Was Monika Grütters on the call, the German minister who retrieved €50 billion for an arts aid package? Or Franck Reister, the French minister who since secured special unemployment benefits for artists until July 2021? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">An Irish Times editorial was right in saying that the problem with the Culture Ministry lay at the cabinet table, where it is perceived as a “trainee brief for new ministers.” Condescended to rather than treated with serious responsibility, its potential has become motionless, except as a carriage ride into upper government. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">That stagnancy may be about to cost us dearly. Last week, the permanent closure of Bewley’s Café in Dublin, due to the impact of the pandemic, has left Bewley’s Café Theatre homeless. A premiere venue for high-quality plays, it is often unafraid to stir lunchtime audiences, with neglected Tennessee Williams dramas and contemporary plays by Malaprop Theatre and DC Moore among its productions. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The worry is that during the Culture Ministry’s current inactivity, more culture institutions and workers will find if unviable to hold onto business. Arts Council surveys of funded organisations and individual artists have found that over €12.75m in invested activities and forecasted profits has been lost. The Department of Public Expenditure and Reform has identified arts and entertainment as one of the sectors most affected by the shutdown.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">A new advisory panel for the Arts Council is expected to detail a financial aid package in the coming weeks, but it’s difficult to be hopeful when the Culture Minister hasn’t even implemented the funding increases in her own Culture 2025 document. It would be a despairing thing for stretches of the arts sector to disappear because too many of its workers are financially damaged. If that happens, it will be on the Culture Ministry’s shoulders. The gilded carriage will transform into a pumpkin.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Nothing will change unless the Culture Minister takes a stand at the cabinet table. </span></div>
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Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446248929778718240.post-24554544676103957042020-04-30T11:10:00.000-07:002020-04-30T12:32:04.610-07:00We’re in Here review: A sly contemporary play about temporary disconnection and lasting gratitude <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="color: #999999;">The narratives of a drama facilitator, a counsellor, and a son remembering his mother intermingle in John Doran's consoling new play. Photo: John Doran</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">★ ★ ★ ★</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">How does theatre adjust to change? In the arch opening scene of John Doran’s new play </span><i style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif;">We’re in Here</i><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">, a man speaks trustingly into a webcam from his Dublin bedroom, on a connection that’s difficult to hear. When he plugs in a microphone, sweet birdsong floods in from outside, and an “astheatre” graphic appears beside his laptop like a portmanteau opening credit. An art form is adapting. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Seen in three parts on YouTube, Doran’s pre-recorded production doesn’t carry the same risk as a performance being streamed live. But there are a few gambits in here that prevent it from feeling like cinema or television either. The play doesn’t mention quarantine per se, but it alludes to the shutdown of theatres. “Welcome to …, and this performance …,” says a front-of-house announcer, with grim absurdity, as if speaking from a wasteland of closed playhouses. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">From his desk, Doran plays an approachable drama facilitator, speaking about the importance of not letting students over-idealise him. He mentions a friend who transformed their Instagram page into an overbearing shrine to their dead mother. The serious voiceover of the front-of-house announcer cuts in, giving information about mental health charities - and even Doran’s own contact details. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Narratives begin to slyly intermingle in part two, where Doran plays a sure-footed counsellor who often prays to his dead mother. He has a session with a client in Kilkenny (a bruised Eddie Murphy) who has recently left his girlfriend and her young son. The session pieces together a complex relationship, and how she got pregnant while cheating with her ex-husband. “I don’t hate the child. It’s just too weird,” says Murphy’s man with guilt, before the camera cuts to him, a picture of despair. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">With sad allusions to closeted homosexuality and child wellbeing, the play revisits a historical episode in part three - when Joe Dolan (an embittered Paul Reid) warned in 1968 that young people wouldn't feel safe if rumours about him being gay weren’t put to rest. The magazine article is read aloud with satire resembling more the intertextual storytelling of contemporary theatre than cinema. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Doran is one our finest comic performers, often appearing in broad comedies. But there’s a rich subtly to his understated performance here. In the final scene he plays a man recalling a childhood in Kilkenny, under the caring protection of a lone mother. He declares his lasting gratitude through the video link, an expression that feels consoling at a time when we're all in camera frames, trying to stay connected. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">We're in Here <i>can be seen by emailing</i> <i>johndoranireland@gmail.com. </i></span><br />
<br />Chris McCormackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809666495562271168noreply@blogger.com0