A good idea to go to the theatre

This column appears in this week's INM Irish regional newspapers.

By Michael Commane

When were you last at a play?

Sitting on my mantelpiece at home there is a voucher for the Abbey. A friend gave it to me as a Christmas gift. It means I have not been to the Abbey this year.

It’s seldom enough I go to the theatre and every time I see a play that I like I’m rebuke myself for staying away.

There’s something about theatre that keeps many people away. Maybe there is a whole swathe of people out there, who think that theatre is not for them. And that sneaky feeling hovers around inside me too. Often when I go to a show the feeling of not being part of the ‘crowd’ pervades my head and stomach too.

Before Easter I went to see ‘Translations’ in the Gaiety. With the exception of some inspiring scenes, I was not greatly taken with the production. My immediate reaction was to say that I’m no theatre expert, so what do I know about it. That was until I read a newspaper review of the performance, which did not rate it too highly. So, after all I might have been right. Whatever ‘right’ might mean.

My thesis is that people might stay away from the theatre because they are afraid that their reaction will not be in accord with the common consensus. Nonsense. Elites have the shocking and terrible ability to hound us out of the way we think. We need to stand up to them.
Some weeks ago a colleague sent around a note at work about a play in which she was involved.

The group call themselves GLAD Productions, which is made up of sisters Lucy and Genevieve and brother Andrew Deering, originally from Dunlavin in Wicklow. Genevieve who lives in Tallaght, is the brains behind the GLAD operation. After some detective work I discovered that the Deerings were involved at a local level in acting back in the 1920s and ’30s.

The play on offer before Easter was ‘The Acute Angina Monologues’. It was billed as a comedy revue and written and devised by the cast.
The venue was The Civic Theatre in The Square in Tallaght. The complex has two theatres and my one for the night held approximately 70 people. A fabulous space, which gives a great sense of intimacy. A gem of a place.

The hour-long play was made up of a number of terribly funny scenes throwing a satirical eye over modern Irish society.

The scene I found the funniest was the young couple, who were planning their wedding. Somewhere on their peregrinations they had encountered all sorts of different cultures, religions and philosophies.

So when it came to organising their own wedding they felt it essential to introduce many of the ideas they had experienced on their travels. Moroccan food was the dish for the day and the religious side of things was to be conducted by a Buddhist monk they met en route. The bride’s mother was just about managing to accept the plans until she was told she would be required to sit on the ground while eating her meal. The proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back.

It was hilarious and the apparent genuine conviction of the bride-to-be to her new-found tastes and beliefs made a remarkable statement about how ‘shallow’ we are about so many things.

It dawned on me driving home that if a Catholic or Anglican priest expressed the sentiments of the play in the context of a Christian service he or she would no doubt be on the Joe Duffy Show for his or her ridiculous traditional views.

Everything in this moving play was done on a small scale. No big fanfares, no big drama, no super modern marketing. All low-key, with great emphasis placed on the local community.

I’ll be paying more attention to what’s on in The Civic Theatre in Tallaght, indeed, what’s on in theatres near me.

Try it. Visit a theatre near you ASAP.