The basic idea of every hard-boiled detective story is that the private eye searches for the clues with which to solve a mystery. It is doubtful, however, whether even Philip Marlowe and Sam Spade working together could find the slightest clue to the mystery at the heart of Inis Theatre's production of Kevin McGee's To Kill a Dead Man. Why has so much talent been lavished on something so utterly pointless? The talent is considerable. Inis is essentially Carmel Stephens and Iseult Golden, both dexterous, s
To Kill a Dead Man
Project, Dublin
Fintan O'Toole
I haven't seen any of Kevin McGee's plays before, but there are enough good lines in To Kill a Dead Man to suggest he is, at least, a clever writer. The basic elements of competent stagecraft and controlled language are all here.
Seldom, however, have so many done so much for so little. The idea that a two-hour drama could be made from yet another pastiche of film noir and 1930s horror movies ought to have faded with the hangover from the night when it was concocted.
To Kill a Dead Man is more a pastiche than a parody, which is a fancy way of saying that it's not very funny. It mimics two familiar styles. One is the Spade/Marlowe crime story, complete with self-loathing, masochistic private eye, femme fatale and upper class murderer. Into this genre is inserted a plot drawn from two Gothic horror classics, Frankenstein and The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde.
None of this, of course, is remotely new. The hard-boiled style already contains large doses of self-parody even in its original sources, and in any case has been sent up so often that it will never come down again.
To Kill a Dead Man does have some glimmer of an idea lurking behind it. Since Golden's detective is a woman pretending to be a man, and Stephen's femme fatale Elsa is possessed by a male spirit, there seems to be some notion of exploring gender identities and split personalities. But it's a vague impulse that remains as inert as the corpse of a stereotypical victim in a Raymond Chandler novel.
For all their formulaic structure, Chandler and Hammett's books work because of their detail. They are laced with a precisely observed physical and geographical reality. Take that away, as happens here, and you're left with the formula itself. It is too empty and threadbare either to make us laugh or to make us think. We end up with something neither wild enough to be funny nor solid enough to be dramatic.
Runs until Feb. 22nd
John Lill (piano), Royal PO
The Helix, Dublin
Martin Adams
Hebrides Overture .......................... Mendelssohn
Piano Concerto No 5 (Emperor) ........ Beethoven
Symphony No 8 ........................................ Dvorak
Liszt's admiration for Mendelssohn's Hebrides Overture was unbounded. That master of programmatic music admired its subtle evocation of time, place and feeling, and its eschewal of obvious depiction. Mendelssohn worked hard to create his prototype of all concert overtures, and especially at the balance between dramatic moment and formal perfection.
Capturing that balance is difficult for performers too, even with musicians as accomplished as those of the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. In concert their playing was full-blooded and subtly coloured. Yet conductor William Boughton paced the overture's parade of contrasts in an oddly unconnected way.
Nor did Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 5 (Emperor) make the impact it can. John Lill's account of the solo part was heroic, ranging from extraordinary power to pin-dropping quietness. However, one longed for a larger-scale rhythmic sweep from everyone, a stronger sense of context for this intense musical drama, and a more animated relationship between piano and orchestra.
The final piece on the programme, Dvorak's Symphony No. 8, was much more persuasive. It is one of this composer's most vigorous symphonic works, and even though the pacing of the unusually contrasted sections in the first two movements was not always convincing, the performance's forceful energy was apt. So was the audience's warm response after a spirited, bold and unsubtle finale.
William Boughton publicly congratulated the hall's architect and acoustician, following which one had the rare sight of a professional orchestra giving a concert hall a round of applause.
Urban Jazz Quintet
Whelans, Dublin
Ray Comiskey
The visit of the Urban Jazz Quintet to Dublin was, as the cliché has it, a game of two halves. The brainchild of Irish drummer Stephen Keogh and British bassist Jeremy Brown, the quintet - now on tour to launch its first CD - features some truly heavyweight talent; apart from Keogh and Brown, the band include Julian Arguelles (tenor), Peter King (alto/soprano) and Michael Buckley (tenor/flute).
All the material played, except an encore, You Don't Know What Love Is, was written and arranged by the band members. It showed the group's virtues from the start. Excellent writing for the saxophones achieved an impressive blend and balance, even on the trickiest pieces, like King's furious opener, Cool Street, while the slower pieces, such as Arguelles's Hi Steve, demonstrated what a lovely sound the reeds could deliver. But the game of two halves?
The first set, unfortunately, was dominated by aggressive drumming as Keogh seemed intent on filling in every available crack. To these ears it limited the options for nuanced performance and perhaps pushed the soloists in directions that were not necessarily always rewarding. It was also more difficult to hear the bass line, an especially important consideration in the absence of a piano.
Helped by some less frenetic tempos, the second set was far more enjoyable. The music seemed to have more room to breathe, while the material - King's Urban Dawn, Arguelles's gorgeous Invisible Thread and Arco Iris, and Keogh's splendid evocation of African high life music, Township - saw each performance handled with a persuasive sense of dynamics.
All three soloists, too, seemed to benefit. There was some fine collective improvisation from flute and tenor on Township, while King was effective on soprano on his own Urban Dawn. Perhaps the highlight of the night was Invisible Thread, with beautiful tenor and alto solos and a reminder of just how fine a player Arguelles is.
NSO/David Brophy
NCH, Dublin
Martin Adams
Lollapalooza .................................... John Adams
Wanting, Not Wanting and Wallop .................... ................................................... Stephen Gardner
Cantigas .................................. Magnus Lindberg
It was not hard to see why Belfast-born Stephen Gardner chose Magnus Lindberg's Cantigas as a companion-piece for his own music.
This concert was the first in the latest Horizon series, which continues the formula of presenting the music of Irish composers in an international context.
In addition to Cantigas and two of his own works, Gardner chose John Adams's Lollapalooza, one of those fun pieces which that composer does so well. Its precise rhythms showed up some ragged edges in the orchestral playing and throughout the concert there was an impression of things being almost what they could have been. Nevertheless, the National Symphony Orchestra and conductor David Brophy communicated clearly, with a good feeling for the character and expressive purpose of each work.
Cantigas takes a completely different approach to achieving length, for it seems to be in perpetual transition. Its virtuosity with the orchestra and with elaborate, highly coloured detail make it a riveting piece. But I found myself wondering if, rather like some Richard Strauss, one is being dazzled by superlative technique. Time will tell.
All four pieces on the programme show a striking ability to control events over time. Stephen Gardner's Wanting, Not Wanting is based on an Irish air, but rises effortlessly above the simplistic notions of quotation and evocation which usually go with that. It is rich in ideas, and knows how to pace their progression so that everything counts.
The composer's tongue-in-cheek programme note for Wallop made light of a serious piece of orchestral exploration. Muscular and vividly coloured, it is an engaging and impressive example of how a simple and historical concept - pitting the orchestral sections against one another - remains a rich source of invention.
