Decked

Theatre Upstairs@the Plough, Abbey St, Dublin Opens Jan 19 1.10pm 10 (incl light lunch) 086-2449511

Karl Shiels and Paul Walker have a knack for turning unlikely spaces into theatres. Few people could ever look at a grotty public convenience the same way again after Walker's ingeniously structured Ladies and Gentsturned toilet cubicles into a stage, making their company Semper Fi seem as interested in innovation as renovation. That site-specific agenda has continued with shows designed for a warehouse, or atmospheric auld Dublin haunts such as the Sick and Indigent Roomkeepers Society. But when an indie theatre company has no space of its own and few frills to spare, it was also born of necessity: as the late night, pub-clearing catchphrase has it, have you no homes to go to?

Rather aptly then, Shiels and Walker, together with technical manager Andy Cummins, have transformed another site – a room over a pub – to create a charmingly modest theatre above Lanigan's Plough bar. Their first plays there, in a season of new works from established writers, are Walker's Deckedand a revival of Peter McKenna's Missing Footballin the 6pm "A Play and a Pint" programme.

Decked is about a man (Ciaran Kenny on a roof, holding a gun, and the story of how he got there. Directed by the author, the play was originally destined for an actual rooftop, before they remembered the temperature and came to their senses. Inaugurating a space for new work in Dublin, Deckedis a show from innovators who are never afraid to aim high.

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