THEATRE
Shibboleth
Peacock Theatre. Ends Oct 31 8pm €13-€20 abbetytheatre.ie
“It’s a big 12-foot-high wall between Themens and Usens, to keep the peace,” explains the construction worker Alan to his young son. He is describing something that, in “post-conflict” Belfast, has become a shibboleth in its own right: called “interface barriers”, “peace lines” or “peace walls” depending on who’s doing the talking. In Stacey Gregg’s acerbic and frenetic new play, the wall itself becomes a speaking part – a singing part too – pleading “build me” to the five men charged with extending the latest division.
"The wall runs though people's heads," says one character and here that belief in division eclipses deeper-rooted identities: Themens and Usens are only vaguely demarcated, dimly aware of their own history. Directed by Hamish Pirie, Shibboleth can seem equally distracted, integrationist in its aesthetic to the point of observing no boundaries. But while Gregg knowingly retreats from major statements, here identities defined in rigid opposition may be the problem, and this wall, like the carnivorous plant in Little Shop of Horrors, threatens to consume everybody.
INDIE ROCK
Ezra Furman
The Limelight 2, Belfast 9pm £13.50 limelightbelfast.com Also Tues, Dublin
And it’s a pleasant hello to yet another musician who adheres to the tradition of subversion within pop music. Chicago’s Furman (above) may perform in make-up and whatever dress he fancies on the day, but his connection to Velvet Underground and Lou Reed’s radical sense of ambiguity cuts through it all. One of the gigs of the week, we reckon.
