ArtScape: Druid Theatre took to London's West End again this week, with the starry opening on Monday night of Geraldine Aron's My Brilliant Divorce at the beautiful, old Apollo Theatre on Shaftesbury Avenue, writes Deirdre Falvey.
It was very much a night for three women: director Garry Hynes, back on the West End after winning Best Director at The Irish Times/ESB Theatre Awards last month, writer Geraldine Aron, in London for the rehearsals - and Dawn French, with perfectly coiffed hair, surrounded by friends and well-wishers ("it was nice to have some mates there"; but so much so that she was barely able to move from the one spot all night), and seeming on top of the world.
"I had heard of Garry - friends who are proper grown-up actors knew and respected her and told me she was to be reckoned with," said French. She'd never heard of Druid Theatre and was surprised when she learned about the tiny theatre space and the impact it has had - and would have loved to have done the play in Galway. "And maybe someday in another life, or in this life at another time.".
"I respect Garry. She's a curious person - she's quite reserved when you first meet her. At the end of our first conversation, I realised I didn't know her personality or anything about her, whereas I had gabbled. You very quickly realise she is fiercely intelligent and knows what she wants and can be strict, and something in me respects and responds to that. I think she's a phenomenon, a small hurricane - she's very tough about what she genuinely believes. However, if there's something in rehearsal that doesn't work, she's prepared to change - which is a sign of someone with great confidence."
They got on well and didn't have a single row. "When there's only two of you all day, it is intensive." But she reckons that women working together "don't want to stop to row. When I work with Jennifer (Saunders) - we take each other's temperature about things".
There was a great atmosphere for the opening. Hynes was joined by her brother, Jerome, of Wexford Opera, and his wife, Alma, and their sister, Emer, who travelled from San Francisco with her daughter. The Irish contingent also included Druid co-founder and actor Marie Mullen, managing director Fergal McGrath, Arts Council director Patricia Quinn, Martin McDonagh, whose Leenane trilogy were rather different Druid productions in London; James Conway, whose Opera Theatre Company production of Ariodante is touring Ireland; Druid chairman Seamus O'Grady, and Fergus Linehan, of the Dublin Theatre Festival.
French's husband, Lenny Henry, was very large and handsome, and her other other-half, Jennifer Saunders, was very glamorous. The theatre, and jammed post-show party at Teatro, just down the road on Shaftesbury Avenue, were coming down with celebs - Robbie Coltrane, Hugh Laurie, John Mortimer, Kathy Burke, Ben Elton, Ade Edmondson, Sheila Hancock, Richard E. Grant - and any number of faces vaguely familiar from British TV shows.
Druid has a long association with Galway-born Aron (who spent much of her adult life in Africa and now divides her time between London, Capetown and the US) stretching back to the late 1970s, and My Brilliant Divorce was commissioned by the company and first produced in Galway in 2001, starring the American actor Glenne Headley. West End producer Michael Codron was interested in bringing the show to London, and along with other producers remounted the Druid production (with Hynes directing and the original designer, Francis O'Connor).The run is limited, bookings are good - and the reviews were, for the most part, positive. The Guardian's Michael Billington wrote: "Dawn French colonises the stage so naturally, and is such funny company that I found myself highly entertained by a show which is about loneliness . . . In the end, the play seems a bit too much of an anthology of misfortunes. But Garry Hynes's production, with its periodic firework eruptions marking the anniversary of Angela's abandonment, is full of visual interest. And there is the profound pleasure of watching French."
Charles Spencer in the Daily Telegraph found French's performance "deeply affecting" and explained: "The show certainly isn't perfect, but there is no doubt that the damn thing works . . . I don't think I have ever seen this endearingly rotund and hugely sympathetic performer in better form than she is in Geraldine Aron's humane play about a middle-aged woman facing up to the end of her marriage . . . Garry Hynes's witty production captures the piece's humour and pain, without always disguising the awkwardness of its shifts in mood."
That slight awkwardness was also mentioned by Benedict Nightingale in the Times. "The problem may be that this is an Irish play whose protagonist has a Dublin-based mother but now inexplicably lives in London. It's not just that there are Catholic imprecations and resonances that must have meant more at its Galway première: it's that performing the funny-sad comes easier to the Irish than the English."
However, Nicholas de Jongh of the Evening Standard hated it: "If a man had dared write this distasteful snigger of a comedy about the despair of a deserted wife he would have been accused of belittling and mocking the marriage pains of the opposite sex."
Rather than attempting to do an Irish accent, French played the role of a woman living in London but with Irish parents, "a bit like my friend Kathy Burke - she has Irish parents but she's a Londoner - though she's more a geezer".
Students at play
For anyone who was ever involved in drama societies at college, the name ISDA has a special ring. Stimulating, varied, a great training ground and terrific fun, college and university drama societies have long been the seedbed for people who go on to make their careers in performance arts. This year, the Irish Student Drama Association Festival (now in its 55th year) is hosted by DU Players at Trinity, and the week (March 7th-14th) is not just something for the nostalgic among us, but a chance for anyone interested in theatre to see a range of productions, both classics and original work, produced with passion and on very little money, and which, to some extent, represent the future of Irish theatre.
Some 23 productions, from Shakespeare to Tom Stoppard, Caryl Churchill to Dylan Thomas, Dario Fo to Marina Carr, as well as five works by new writers among the students, will be presented by the drama societies from third-level colleges all over Ireland. The performances are at the Samuel Beckett Theatre and Players at Trinity, the New Theatre and Project Cube in Temple Bar, and Dramsoc UCD, and culminate in an awards ceremony on Friday, March 14th.
Running a festival is no joke for a group of students - two fourth-year drama students are directors, there's a committee of six and lots of others involved - "it's surprising how much work has been involved" since they started working on it a year ago, says press officer Emily Taaffe. And they've topped it by mounting a fringe festival featuring comedy, music and workshops. They hope lots of people will come to see their work, which represents a wide range of styles. Programmes available from Players Theatre in Trinity, or the other venues, or www.isda2003.com
And furthermore . . .
The move by Seamus Crimmins, head of Lyric FM, to the Arts Council as arts policy director (vacant since Dermot McLaughlin moved to Temple Bar Properties) means the council's executive now includes some high-profile music people - aside from director Patricia Quinn (formerly music officer), John O'Kane recently moved from Music Network to become arts programme director at the council. Crimmins is on temporary secondment from RTÉ, but leaves Lyric, which will advertise for a new head. Meanwhile, O'Kane has been replaced as chief executive at Music Network by Deirdre McCrea. Previously regional development officer and latterly education and healthcare manager with Music Network, which develops classical, traditional and jazz, McCrea said she was coming to the position "at a time of economic uncertainty, but I will do my best to ensure that relevance, creativity and quality remain key features of the organisation" . . . For anyone with a passing interest in opera, who fancies digging a bit deeper, and having a good weekend doing it, there's About Opera, an alternative to St Patrick's weekend, at Coolattin Lodge in Co Wicklow. Subtitled Passion without Pretention, the weekend (March 14th-17th) is led by Colman Morrissey and covers the evolution of opera in Europe from 1600 to the early 20th century, focusing on the works of the maestros of each period, and a comparative study of the Bel Canto, Opera Seria and Opera Buffo traditions. The weekend, which the organisers describe as having a "house party" atmosphere, costs €350 per person. Details from Anne Agnew 055-29474 (anne@coolattin.com) or Marianne O'Malley 0402-38264 (appletree@eircom.net)