One-act plays are the short stories of stage drama,
writes Brian Byrne. Like in literature, there’s a special skill in revealing the complexities of human existence in the short form. Equally, there’s a particular craft in how actors interpret those stories and bring them successfully from the stage to the audience.
Both those skills were absolutely in evidence in the Kilcullen Drama Group’s presentation of three one-act plays this week.
In
The Quiet Land, Malachy McKenna tells a very modern story against the background of the changing life and culture of rural Ireland. Any of us who have grown up in the country will understand the familiar that is fading as the time of the two characters runs down. Meeting at a gate linking their neighbouring farms has been their habit over the years, discussing issues of the day and memories from their boyhood.
But this meeting will be different. McKenna’s script cleverly brings the threads of their far and recent pasts together towards a new future for each. The script is served by actors Gerry O’Donoghue and Maurice O’Mahony with the skill it deserves by two veterans of the Kilcullen stage, enhanced by the alchemy of Letitia Hanratty’s direction and design.
The language in a play written by a 19th-century writer could get in the way of becoming lost in the story told in a 21st-century theatre. But JM Synge's
In the Shadow of the Glen does time travel surprisingly well in the capable hands of director Gerry O'Donoghue (he stepped away from the farm gate for this) and a stellar cast led by Dick Dunphy, back on the stage in Kilcullen 66 years on from when he first appeared there.
The tale is messily eternal, set in rural Ireland, true to its time and yet still relevant. Fiona Kelly, as the scheming wife, brings her character and Synge's language to life superbly, while Fergus Ryan's man of the road seeking shelter is a masterclass in characterisation. Harry Murphy has grown into the quality actor one would expect from his family pedigree. All four mesh perfectly in this production, both foils and supports to each other.
Esther Reddy made her directorial debut with
Baby Steps in this trio of presentations, and it's clear that she and her cast had a lot of fun with this thoroughly modern tale of tangled relationships on the verge of failure. Enda O'Neill and Katie Daffy, relative newcomers to the group, play characters trying to rebuild their marriage through the metaphor of assembling a flatpack baby's cot (spoiler alert: the cot does get assembled).
On the other side of the stage is the chorus of Colette Fitzgerald, Colette Murran, Joan Murphy and Audrey Philipps, taking us through the pair's past in a string of one-liners, single words, and hilarious facial commentary. Lorraine Clarke makes a short but essential appearance. It's all a perfect counterpoint to the rurality of the other two plays.
A tiny play ender, written by Dermot Bolger for the Fishamble Theatre, finishes the evening. Performed skilfully by Eilis Philips,
Where Will We Go? asks us to think of the characters left behind when the curtain falls and the audience departs.
It has been some time since Kilcullen Drama Group, including the always great backstage crew, has given us the particular entertainment of the one-acts. They haven't lost their touch.
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