A 'Shirley Valentine' tour de force

Just some of the expressions mirroring the life of Willy Russell's 'Shirley Valentine', as played in a bravura performance by Evelyn O'Sullivan last night in Kilcullen's Town Hall Theatre, writes Brian Byrne.

For some 100 minutes, her character held a full-house audience spellbound, alternately flipping moods from the despair of the woman's suffocated life to the laughter moments that she was still capable of. And which were to flower fully again on her journey outside her kitchen wall, to a Greek island where wine, sun, and a little romance rebooted her life.

If you have a ticket for tonight's performance, do not miss it. And be prepared to, as happened last night, give Evelyn and her director in their EvE Productions, Eunice Lavelle, the standing ovation so richly deserved.