BERNICE HARRISONon alternatives to movies and the mall
Junction Festival
The organisers of this year’s Clonmel Junction Festival know how to get their annual showcase of comedy and theatre off the ground with more than the usual amount of hot air. Look up in the skies around the Co Tipperary town tonight and tomorrow and you’ll be rewarded with the staggeringly beautiful and colourful sight of hot-air balloons drifting across the sky. The balloons are being launched from Powerstown Park Racecourse today and tomorrow at 7pm, and at 6.30am tomorrow, weather permitting of course.
The programme of events includes several child-friendly shows, including ones for really small children, from The Bedmaker, an interactive performance for children aged three to five, and Silly Stocking Stories and Other Fun Noises, an hour of fun, strange noises and silly stories from the guitar- wielding Ó Suilleabhain brothers, Eoin and Moley. Both at Junction Theatre @ Chadwick’s. Book at the box office in Market Place (052-6128521).
A fantastic addition to the festival – and one that should prove a happy refuge for footsore parents and overtired children – is the Playlounge, which has been developed by the artist Brigid Teehan in collaboration with Theresia Guschlbauer. For the past three months they have been working with local parents to create a relaxing, fun, family-friendly space. It is open during the day at Junction Theatre @ Chadwick’s until July 11th.
www.junctionfestival.com