The year is pushing on folks. We’re almost into August, as the arts festival programmes that I see everywhere keep reminding me. As much as I like the festival, it’s a reminder that the summer is drawing to a close, and with the weather we’ve had this year we need something to brighten things up.
Even if the sun doesn’t shine during the festival, and it usually does, the opening performance by La Compagnie Malabar from France on the first Saturday night should lighten up the gloom. The giant creature Helios will make its way through the streets from Dean Street up to Kilkenny Castle where he will evoke the construction of the sun with an explosion of light as the finale. Sounds good to me; maybe Mr Helios might leave the formula for creating the sun with us for a few weeks, we could do with it.
You could just move up to Kilkenny Castle for the festival, pitch a tent in the grounds (don‘t dare ), nip over to the Kilkenny Design Centre when hungry, and then enjoy all that‘s going in within the castle walls. There’s a huge range of events taking place there in the parade tower, the castle grounds and in the magnificent great hall.
On my list of ‘must sees’ is the production of Brian Friel’s Translations. I’ve seen this play a couple of times and there’s no need for me to add to the accolades it has received over the years from critics all over the world. It’s fitting that the play should be performed in the great hall of Kilkenny Castle, a building that his daughter, Paddy, has done so much to develop over the years.
The play is directed by Denis Conway, an actor familiar to fans of Bickerstaffe Theatre Company at Cleere’s back in the 90s who has gone on to bigger and better things. Denis is one of those actors that gives everything to a performance, he even made his role in the awful John Water‘s play The Long Black Coat into some meaningful. He’s working with a premier league cast for Translations and it promises to be a memorable theatrical experience in the great hall of the castle.
That’s just small selection of events taking place over the first few days of the festival and there‘s lots of free stuff both on the streets and up in MacDonagh Junction, so there‘s another moneysaving tip for these hard times. Next week I’ll take a look at what else is going on — 10 days isn’t going to be long enough to fit everything in.
