Passionfruit Theatre Co proudly presents Birds of the Innocent Woods, written by Joe Ducke and directed by Grainne Moore.
The play will take place in the Athlone venue from Wednesday May 18 to Saturday May 21, with the show starting at 8pm.
Birds of the Innocent Woods is a historical drama which explores the themes of revenge, superstition, and religious and ethnic difference against a backdrop of the Eleven Years War, the midsummer festival, the deep and mysterious Lough Ree, and the Midland bogs burning in the searing summer heat.
The action takes place on Nuns’ Island in Lough Ree and the Franciscan Abbey in Athlone, in 1641. Antonio, the friar, tolerates Captain Tyrell, the drunken and, it turns out, murderous English officer, while making visits to the convent at Nuns’ Island, where he learns of the appearance of a corpse clothed in an English uniform on the shore.
Margaret Marinan, the scullery maid, has arrived from Thomand in the south, and is regarded with suspicion and even superstition by the abbess and the other novices. She is courted by William, the Irish hydrographer surveying Lough Ree, whose English colleague has recently drowned. Margaret is reclusive and we later learn that she has joined the nuns after witnessing the murder of a child.
With the death of Captain Tyrell and the appearance of his half-brother, English-Irish resentment boils over and the dichotomies of innocence/ guilt, English / Irish, and Christian/ pagan are played out to their tragic end.
Tickets are priced at €10 and bookings can be made by calling (086 ) 3338457.
