Until Oct 17 01-6778899 dublintheatrefestival.com
The difference between the humble business of putting on shows and the impressive act of staging an event is really just a matter of impact. Why stage just one play when a trilogy will do? This year the Ulster Bank Dublin Theatre Festival, which has been a major event for 53 years, is going for maximum effect. There is, by my count, one trilogy, two trios, a triptych and a cascade of headline- grabbing one-offs.
Three major pieces from three directors mark the Polish Season, with Krystian Lupa's stately and scintillating (not to mention 7½ hour-long) portrait of Andy Warhol in Factory 2as its centrepiece, while Lupa's acolytes Grzegorz Jarzyna and Jan Klata funnel his influence into their T.E.O.R.E.M.A.T.and The Danton Case, respectively.
The Gate stages four works by three connected writers in Beckett Pinter Mamet, a prospect made more tantalising by its influx of new Irish directors: Aoife Spillane Hinks, Tom Creed and Wayne Jordan join stalwart Alan Stanford.
Belgium’s Ontroerend Goed return with a trilogy of intimate and literally involving works (you’ll be talking about them for years if you get a ticket), while Hugh Hughes brings three imaginative pieces of heart-warming whimsy to the festival.
The Abbey may be stealing attention with its star power and classical topicality (Alan Rickman. Ibsen. Disgraced banker.) but it's Rough Magic's new version of Phaedra by Hilary Fannin, Pan Pan's The Rehearsal, Playing the Daneand Tim Crouch's controversial The Authorthat are generating the most ardent buzz.
“Sex and parties are the two things you still have to actually be there for,” said Andy Warhol, but events like these remind you that theatre squarely belongs on that list.
