AS THE curtain rises on 2010, what theatrical ‘goodies’ can playgoers look forward to at the Town Hall Theatre over the coming year?
Renmore Panto’s highly entertaining Mother Goose holds sway until January 17 and will doubtless draw full houses for the rest of its run. After that, the new season commences in earnest and, fittingly, the first play of the year is a new offering by local author Jack Kirwan, entitled Playing At Plays.
Performed by Company Productions, and directed by Anthony Daley, it portrays the sundry trials and tribulations of the lead-up to a stage performance, immersing the audience in the experience of taking a play from script to first night. It’s at the Town Hall studio from Monday 18 to Friday 22.
Galway-based companies are much to the fore in the coming months with One Shot World reprising their staging of Reservoir Dogs (January 25 to 30 ), Water Donkey Theatre presenting Love Song, based on TS Eliot’s ‘Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock’ (February 10 to 13 ), Mephisto Theatre doing Carol Ann Duffy’s The World’s Wife (February 22 to 27 ), KATS staging Henrik Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler (February 24 to 26 ), and Poor Mouth Productions performing Frank McGuiness’s Someone Who’ll Watch Over Me (March 22 to 27 ).
As ever, there are also plenty of visiting productions to look forward to. CoisCeim Dance Theatre arrive on January 26 with a double-bill of Muirne Bloomer’s As You Are and David Bolger’s Faun (which puts a modern spin on the famed Nijinsky piece ‘L’Apres-Midi d’un Faun’ ). On February 1, the RSC’s Gerard Logan performs Shakespeare’s narrative poem The Rape Of Lucrece, while from February 3 to 6, actress Eilin O’Dea presents her much-acclaimed performance of Molly Bloom’s soliloquy from Ulysses.
Sligo’s Blue Raincoat are here from February 4 to 6, with Jocelyn Clarke’s new adaptation of Flann O’Brien’s terrific comic novel At Swim Two Birds and the following week Alan Stanford’s Second Age company make their annual visit, with this year’s offering being Hamlet.
Menopause The Musical, featuring Twink and Linda Martin, makes a return visit in March while that month also sees the Irish premiere production of smash hit My First Time, a compendium of stories about hysterical and heart-breaking first sexual experiences.
Looking further ahead in the year, details of the programme are still being put in place but among the events will be the Barrabas production of Johnny Patterson, the Singing Irish Clown, starring Littlejohn Nee. There will be two major productions from the Abbey Theatre; a brand new play in October, and a major production of a well-known title in November. Circus of Horrors will make its first visit to Galway since its sell-out run in Galway Arts Festival some years back and City Theatre will bring a new staging of Dracula.
Fidget Feet Aerial Dance Theatre will present its spectacular and sensual Madam Silk, there will be a new Town Hall production directed by Andrew Flynn, a visit from Opera Theatre Company, a Druid special event in May, and a major new Druid production of a well-known title in August/September.
Watch this space for further details.
