Irish Timeswriters review a selection of events.
Orange Flower
Water Mill Theatre, Dundrum
The European premiere of Craig Wright's play, first seen in New York three years ago, has been brought to Dublin by Riff Raff Theatre. Its essential theme is the complexity of human emotions, with sex as a major ingredient. This is developed through two married couples, friends for 15 years. But in recent times pharmacist David has developed a strong relationship with Brad's wife Beth, and the breaker is about to engulf them.
The only setting is a bed, on which the action and dialogue are centred. David is about to consummate the relationship when Beth's deeply-felt reluctance surfaces, not for the first time. Her reasons are moral, rooted in conscience. Does their feeling of love justify the break-up of her marriage and the loss of her children; is it that important? David believes that it is, and is ready to sacrifice his own family to it.
Brad, an earthy businessman, has known for a long time what was happening, but values his family above his feelings until Beth tells him she is leaving. He then passes the word to David's wife Cathy, and their worlds disintegrate in unison.
Locked into a new life, David is oppressed by financial problems, while his love for his children is not so easily shrugged away. But life has another surprise in store.
The author's writing is cogent and convincing, delineating real people grappling with their own weaknesses and moral confusions. Here Steve Gunn (David), Amy Hastings (Cathy), Laura Way (Beth) and Tim Dillard (Brad) inhabit their roles with conviction, making it easy for the audience to connect with their dilemmas. Michael Way's taut direction keeps the show firmly on the road. Gerry Colgan
Until tomorrow
Two for Dinner for Two
Project Cube, Dublin
In Two for Dinner for Two BDNC Theatre invites an audience to share an evening with a couple at war. The scene is familiar: a woman arrives home from work laden with shopping bags; her husband is hungry and irritable. The recipe books come out, the arguments begin, and amidst the sharp knives, hot stoves and hand blenders, the potential for fatalities is enormous.
The hour-long piece, devised and directed by Ciarán Taylor, draws its influence from the tradition of Jacques Lecoq, which concentrates on the physicality of performance as theatrical narrative. Set in a meticulously recreated and fully-functioning kitchen, the physical act that Two for Dinner for Two focuses on is the preparation of the dinner itself: the act of cooking and eating an Italian risotto and a chocolate cake live on stage in real time.
The preparation - dicing of peppers, sweating of onions - is interspersed with brief interludes of choreographed movement, as the couple tousle with tea-towels, climb on the countertops and circle each other with sharpened knives.
Two for Dinner for Two , however, is a slight entrée rather than a satisfying intellectual meal. Ruth Lehane and Karl Quinn struggle to make the domestic dance seem like an organic part of the action, while the original live score - composed by Jane O'Leary, performed by Tine Verbenke and Bernie Balfe - is relied upon to provide the emotional atmosphere and much of the humour. While the routines and arguments are familiar, there is nothing more than familiarity for an audience to engage with; no philosophy of what domestic life reveals about human nature.
There is an appealing ambition in the company's attempt to transform the mundane chores of domestic life into theatrical spectacle. However, what ultimately makes these chores bearable in real life is the greater end that they serve: the satisfaction of our natural appetites, and, ultimately, our continued survival. Unfortunately, BDNC recreate all of the labour of domestic life, but none of the love. For the characters this amounts to a bad case of heartburn; for the audience, intellectual indigestion. Sara Keating
Until Jan 20
RTÉCO, Glasnevin Musical Society, O'Brien, Molloy/Brophy
NCH, Dublin
Dipping into six of the best-loved operas of Gilbert and Sullivan, the RTÉ Concert Orchestra and the chorus of Glasnevin Musical Society were under the baton of David Brophy, whose appointment as the RTÉCO's principal conductor was announced at the start of the concert.
Brophy's experience across a wide gamut of musical styles makes him eminently well suited to such a versatile band. And on this occasion, he showed that he can be an engaging and informative compere, too.
The players responded to their new maestro with warmth and easy-going precision in the overtures to The Mikado, HMS Pinafore, The Gondoliers and The Pirates of Penzance. (It was a shame that this selection of highlights didn't include either of Sullivan's most accomplished curtain-raisers, the ones he penned for Iolanthe and The Yeomen of the Guard.) The Glasnevin choristers had been drilled to a fault, presumably by the uncredited Jay Shanahan. With never a consonant out of place nor a vowel roughly finished, they blended fun and fastidiousness in the best G & S tradition.
Sounding as if she too had just graduated from the elocution class of some latter-day Professor Higgins, soprano soloist Sylvia O'Brien immersed herself in the Savoy style, and revealed some of her finest vocal qualities.
The Sun, Whose Rays (Mikado), Kind Sir (Gondoliers) and Poor Wandering One (Pirates) had dramatic dignity and bell-like clarity. No less to the manner born was solo bass-baritone John Molloy, who characterised his varied roles - the Mikado, Sir Joseph Porter (Pinafore), Private Willis (Iolanthe) and the sergeant (Pirates) - with a range of communicative gestures and satisfying tones. And thanks to his crisp enunciation as Ko-Ko, there was no missing the names on an amusing little list specially drawn up for the occasion by John Allen. Andrew Johnstone
