Irish Times writers give their verdict
In Bella Copia Project, Dublin
Michael Seaver
"There's nothing much to see," says Simone Sandroni towards the end of In Bella Copia, just before he takes his trousers off. This metaphorically loaded stripping, carried out by all of the performers, is the final act in a journey of self-discovery that lasted over an hour and didn't offer much to see either. Former performers with Belgian Wim Vanderkeybus, Sandroni and co-artistic director Lenka Flory moved to Prague and formed Déjà Donné and, at the time, made claims that pioneering work was needed and a pathway cleared for new companies. Blurring theatre and reality became their trademark through works like Aria Spinta, but the concept seems to have slipped away from them on the evidence of the clumsy and disappointing In Bella Copia.
Strong characters lay their dreams before us, some trivial but all heartfelt. Whether a sleazy smooth Mr. Entertainment or a dreamy romantic girl, personal realities unravel the dreams. The flimsy identities are constructed by costume: a long rack of clothes stretches down one side of the stage and acts as wings that the players disappear behind as well as a collection of off-the-peg personalities. Movement hasn't the same ability to give identity and seems limited in range of expression and dynamic. Instead kinetic interest is mainly provided by the moving lighting rigs that refocus our view and give surges of intensity to the vulnerabilities onstage. The moments of revelation of the broken dreams come at different times for each performer but they all feel unprepared and without dramatic preparation, the inner struggle remaining hidden.
There is an earnest intensity to the work of Déjà Donné but the superficiality of the dreams give little reason to empathise or even care about the characters. At the end, when they disrobe and disappear behind the clothes rack, now across the front of the stage, there is a sense of inevitability that might have been short-circuited in the previous 70 minutes.
The Young Man With the Cream Tarts Lagan Weir, Belfast
Jane Coyle
It's the middle of the night and Belfast is silent and slumbering. The only life and movement is to be found along the river, restlessly snaking its way to the sea and ushering creaking cargo vessels up its maze of channels and into harbour. But an inquisitive writer named Prince is wide awake. He pops out for what is intended to be an innocent nocturnal stroll, only to encounter a strange young man called Dorian (Chris Robinson), carrying a plate of cream buns and beckoning him towards untold mysteries in the dark, eerie underworld which he inhabits.
Writers Declan Feenan and Lisa McGee had been haunted by Robert Louis Stevenson's short story The Suicide Club long before they found the perfect space in which to realise it. In collaboration with director Jonathan Harden, they have crafted a lyrical and disconcertingly tense little thriller, leading audiences on a claustrophobic journey along the subterranean passageways, which divide the east and west banks of the Lagan and whose acoustics throw up the odd diction problem here and there.
Along with the impressionable Prince - authoritatively played by Conor Morrison - we are pitched into a grotesque human gathering, from which there is, literally, no escape. Characters appear out of unexpected corners and in tantalising long perspective, each marking a new chapter in Prince's willing descent.
One by one, a priest named Cloth (Joe Rea), who has studied so much theology he can no longer see common sense; a bewitching and controlling young woman Anais (Bronagh Taggart); the insecure Eos, for whom life has taken a wrong turn (Lisa Andrews); and the glinting master of ceremonies Malthus (Marc O'Shea) each take turns in preparing Prince for his final test, a sinister card game played for the highest possible stakes. This is only the second production from the Belfast company Sneaky, rising out of Queen's University's drama department and offering intriguing creative possibilities for audiences and practitioners alike. More, please.
Typhoid Mary New Theatre, Temple Bar
Gerry Colgan
This 45-minutes play, written and performed by Eithne McGuinness, first saw the footlights during the Dublin Fringe Festival 1997, when it was well received. It is not the sort of work that ages, being essentially of the slice-of-life category. The monologue format is well suited to storytelling of this kind.
The story is a true one, about Mary Mallon from Cookstown who emigrated to New York at the start of the 20th century. She worked her way up from low-grade employment to become a cook for wealthy families, which led to disaster. The Board of Health found that some of her clients had contracted typhoid, and concluded that she was a carrier of, though not a sufferer from, the dreaded disease - a rare diagnosis.
Mary was at first held in isolation and, on her release, went back to forbidden cooking. The authorities charged her with murder, and she was incarcerated for 25 years. They acted largely on circumstantial evidence, and ignored some scientific findings in Mary's favour. The truth is lost in the mists of time.
It is a strange story, and relies on a vivid performance by the author for its theatrical interest. Eithne McGuinness enters into the character of the feisty woman, and creates an empathy that stays until the rather abrupt ending. Maureen Collender directs.
NT Shell Connections Everyman , Cork
Mary Leland
The engaging autobiography of playwright Enda Walsh set the tone of welcome and celebration for the young audience - and performers - at the opening of the National Theatre Shell Connections festival of youth drama. Plays written for youth theatre companies are selected for performance in Ireland and the UK in a week-long showcase before the festival culminates at the National Theatre in London.
A hearty endorsement of the programming principles was given by a couple of young actors in Philip Ridley's separate but paired monologues Karamazoo. First a teenage girl, then - the sequence divided deliberately by another play - a teenage boy reveal their ideas of self. Each script is demanding, as the player has to stand alone, without the support of a set or any prop other than a mobile phone. Yet they must hold a typically restless audience for 20 minutes of speech. Both Rachel Lally and Ger Brady justified the faith of the Kildare Youth Theatre in these pieces and in their own grasp of timing and identification. The work is sharp, combining comedy and pathos, and although it's not quite clear who they address, or indeed why, the bravado of these confessional episodes is convincing. Directors Karina Power and Peter Hussey might only be faulted on projection.
Between these pieces, the ambitious efforts of Independent Theatre Workshop and director Gillian Oman failed to rescue Headstrong by April de Angelis. An unwieldy, evangelistic comment on aspects of the industrial revolution and the opium wars, but with gallant performances by the cast.
