Drama Circle’s Directors’ Debut

Last week, the Hawk’s Well Theatre hosted an interesting and novel evening’s drama which also afforded three young directors the opportunities of presenting their productions of one act plays, very much off the beaten track. These plays, which contrasted sharply from each other in many respects, varied from an infrequently performed piece by Seán O’ Casey, to a premier performance of a play by a young UCD graduate, Shane Byrne. The three directors, Brenda Boyle, Yvonne Curran and Jane Fitzpatrick are entitled to feel a fair amount of satisfaction and indeed pride, because the evening was not just an intriguing couple of hours of experimental theatre – it was a genuinely entertaining and stimulating programme, even if there were some imperfections here and there.

The programme opened with Brenda Boyle’s production of Seán O’ Casey’s satirical comedy “Bedtime Story” which combined elements of burlesque comedy, with fairly pointed satire of the inhibited society of Ireland in the 1940’s. This production succeeded in getting the laughs from the audience but, as is often the pitfall in comedies, the characters tended to be exaggerated, where a more subtle approach may have been more effective. Andrea Carroll was quite impressive on the part of Angela Nightingale, her brassy performance leaving little doubt about her talent for weaving an intelligent web, in which the pious John Joe Mulligan becomes inextricably ensnared. John Gaffney showed good promise in the part of Dan Halibut, his Cavan/Dublin hybrid accent being apt for the part of the provincial man-about-town in the play. I thought the set, whilst comprising carefully selected props, seemed to be somewhat restrictive and appeared to inhibit the movement of the cast on stage.

The most interesting offering of the evening’s programme was undoubtedly Yvonne Curran’s production of “Worlds Apart”, the futuristic, space-age play by Shane Byrne. Briefly, this play was Beckett-like in its treatment of the hopeless dilemma of three astronauts in an ill-fated voyage to Titan, one of the moons of the planet Saturn. This play was very cleverly written, with many witty and ironical allusions in the script. The play was well handled by the director and her cast, and good, even performances were given by the youthful cast of Tom O’ Dowd, Padraig Harte, Frank Clinton, Brid Feehily and John Carty.

The last offering of the evening was an intriguing and subtle satire, which falls into the category of  “Theatre of the Absurd”. The setting was the type of desert island, depicted in newspaper and magazine cartoons, complete with a single coconut palm and miscellaneous flotsam and jetsam, washed up on the golden, tropical sand. Among these items, after a storybook shipwreck, are the only survivors, Arthur, who can hink but cannot take action, and the pragmatic Doreen, whose best friend is her Mum. Matters on the tropical island take a strange turn, when mum is eventually conjured up to materialise on the island. A shadowy figure, who turn out to be Arthur and Doreen’s offspring-to-be, wishes to be a brain surgeon, a somewhat impossible aspiration in an isolated desert island! The play is essentially a send-up of conventional society and mores and Jane Fitzpatrick’s production was competent and interesting. In short, it was an intriguing play, intelligently handled. Ann Hamill, as Doreen was impressive in her stage debut, and Collette Mc Bride was also very good as mum. Larry Tierney as Arthur and Patrick Mc Grath as Normal also showed promise.

I think Sligo Drama Circle are to be commended for giving valuable directing, producing and acting experience to young directors and their teams, as well as giving the theatre-going public an opportunity of seeing production of avant-garde and refreshing new work.

 Press Cutting, October, 1984