THE PRIDE OF PARNELL STREET. To 6 October.
London
THE PRIDE OF PARNELL STREET
by Sebastian Barry.
Tricycle Theatre To 22 September
Mon-Sat 8pm Mat Sat 4pm & 19 Sept 2pm
then Tivoli Theatre Dublin 26 September-6 October.
Wed-Sat; Tue-Sat 7.30pm Mat Sat & Sun 1pm.
Post-show discussion 3 Oct.
Runs 1hr 45min No interval.
TICKETS: 020 7328 1000.
www.tricycle.co.uk (London).
01 677 8899 (£2 admin charge per ticket).
www.dublintheatrefestival.com (no admin charge online)(Dublin).
Review: Timothy Ramsden.
Faith in a city beautifully delineated.
For 100+ minutes the two superb performers in Sebastian Barry’s new play hold an audience spellbound with their intercut monologues of life at the lower end of resurgent Dublin. Fishamble Theatre Company (previously Pigsback; they choose their names so delicately) have a production that hits home, even playing away in London.
Man and wife Mary and Joe are in love. As Dublin reinvents itself, he spends most of his time in prison or secure hospital, moving from car-crime to drugs and AIDS infection while what happens to her becomes clear as the accounts unfold. Love isn’t easy, though that doesn’t take the shine off the city for Janet.
Despite the violence that surrounds, and can come between, them Janet has a vigour and Joe a determination, which makes sense of the lyrical flavour in so much of the dialogue. She’s the Pride of Parnell Street for him, but for her another determined inhabitant of the place bears the title. What’s remarkable is that, in a street that sounds as if its reality is far removed from the aspirations of Irish identity its name suggests, there can be so much pride. Yet it never seems – well, proud.
This pair’s love is shown through their accounts as separated people. This separation justifies the story-telling monologue structure, a form with instant initial attractions which, unless carefully handled, can come to seem half-way towards a novel, missing the intricacies of relationships the stage best shows.
Mary Murray’s Janet is initially difficult to follow; rightly, for this is someone not used to long explanations. Her words follow her mind’s diversions until she’s fully into her tale. Murray also brings a keen manner that’s polar opposite to Karl Shiels’ Joe. When he pulls his shaven-headed, bruise-discoloured body out of bed, lowering himself muscle by painful muscle onto a seat, constantly short of breath, his slow, hefty style self-evidently results from sickness.
His space is the confined hollow of a secure hospital as she moves more freely, occasionally coming flirtatiously close to him, but clearly in a separate space until the final moment of redemptive contact.
Janet: Mary Murray.
Joe: Karl Shiels.
Director: Jim Culleton.
Designer/Costume: Sabine Dargent.
Lighting: Mark Galione.
Sound: Denis Clohessy.
2007-09-13 11:48:00