Irish Mail on Sunday review Philadelphia, Here I Come!

Michael Moffat of the Irish Mail on Sunday also reviewed Philadelphia, Here I Come! Giving the review 4 stars and describing the production as "excellent", this is one in a long series of extremely positive reviews of the Production.

Sparkling take on Friel’s split-personality story
Philadelphia Here I Come!
On tour (see below) ****

IF BRIAN FRIEL'S earliest big success had been written as a film script, it would surely have had a sequel to follow the adventures in Philadelphia of the gormless young failure from Ballybeg. He is a failed student a failure in love, he's no great shakes as a businessman, yet he deludes himself with daydreams about his future in the US as a red-hot womaniser and tycoon. His father, SB O'Donnell, has at least built up a decent business and is a county councillor, yet SB is the villain of the play.

I have often thought it would be interesting to look into the mind of SB contemplating the incompetence of his big eejit of a son, in the same way that we get a look into Gar's mind.
In this excellent production, Sean Stewart as Gar Public and Marty Rea as Gar Private, get across the full measure of pathos and manic humour in the character, especially in the painful scene with Kathy and that deeply moving scene in which Gar and his father begin to communicate tentatively, but which ends as Gar's childhood boating memory is shattered.

The strong cast includes Conan Sweeney as the archetypal hard-man Ned, and Walter McMonagle as a not unsympathetic SB. Joan Sheehy is suitably creepy as Lizzy Sweeney but Enda Oates doesn't capture the seedy arrogance, and self-delusion of Master Boyle, who is so casually dismissive of Gar's limited abilities. The prayerful mutterings in the rosary scene distracted from Gar's fantasising but director Alan Stanford generally orches­trates everything at a fine pace and has bravely allowed dra­matic silences, which can be dangerous when playing to school audiences, although the only intrusive noise I heard was from a teacher's mobile.

The fine set by Eileen Diss is typical of the attention to detail that goes into these Second Age productions. •
Touring:
Everyman, Cork,Nov. 20-23:
Pavilion, Dún Laoghaire Nov 29 - Dec 1

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Caitríona Ní Mhurchú to play Lady Macbeth

Second Age is delighted that Caitríona Ní Mhurchú will reprieve her role as Lady Macbeth. Caitríona has worked with Second Age a number of times now, most recently in the 2006 production of Macbeth. A graduate of the Gaiety School of Acting, Caitríona has worked extensively in theatre and television. Her appearances at the Abbey and Peacock include Beauty in a Broken Place, Ariel, and Caoineadh Airt Uí Laoghaire and she has also worked with Alan Stanford at the Gate Theatre on a number of occassions, most recently in The Constant Wife.
Her television experience is extensive that includes roles in Proof and Fair City for RTE, and Ballykissangel for the BBC.
Caitríona is a fluent Irish speaker and has worked extensively through Irish when she has written, directed and voiced cartoons for TG4, including Spongebob Squarepants, The Muppet Show and Scooby Doo. Caitríona's first novel for young people Ó Lúibíní Lú has just been published by Cló Iar-Chonnachta.

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David Shannon to play title role in Macbeth 2008

Second Age is thrilled to announce that David Shannon, who delighted both audience and critics with his breathtaking performance as Sweeney Todd at the Gate Theatre, is set to play the title role in Macbeth.

His Sweeney Todd was rapturously received by both Dublin Audiences and the critics who described the "phenomenal performances by David Shannon......Shannon's coiled intensity, looming physical presence and vocal richness" (The Guardian) "David Shannon makes a marvellously brooding Sweeney" (Sunday Independent) ,"David Shannon, ... makes a compellingly intense and beautifully voiced Todd"(The Irish Times). The verdict was unanimous, that Shannon has an outstanding talented with an immense presence. Whilst it may have been his performance in Sweeney Todd that brought David to the attention of Dublin audiences, David has long been playing to considerable critical acclaim on the international stage. He has played Chris in Miss Saigon UK tour (Mayflower, Southampton, Birmingham Hippodrome, Bristol Hippodrome); Alternate Chris in Miss Saigon UK tour (Edinburgh Playhouse, Point Theatre Dublin); and has played in numerous other Musical Theatre greats including Pimp/Claquesous and understudy Enjolras in Les Miserables (Point Theatre, Dublin and Edinburgh Playhouse)and the star role in one of West Ends most celebrated musicals The Phantom of the Opera

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David will start rehearsing Macbeth in late December, the show will open at An Grianán Letterkenny before touring to the TownHall Galway, Everyman Palace Theatre Cork and finally to the Helix Theatre Dublin.

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Sunday Times Reviews Philadelphia, Here I Come!

Today three more reviews have been published via the Sunday Papers; namely the Sunday Business Post, The Irish Mail on Sunday, and the Sunday Times. All 3 are uniformly positive, but it is Declan Burkes review in the Sunday Times, that strikes me as particularly pertinent. Colin Murphy of the Sunday Tribune struggled to find the contemporary relevance of the play, and here Declan Burke, highlights the relationships within the play are as resonant today as they were in 1960's Ireland.

Philadelphia, Here I Come!

Emigration is no longer the unavoidable exile for many that it was when Brian Friel's play was first produced in 1964, but a young man's inability to connect emotionally with his family is as relevant as ever. Gar Public (Sean Stewart) - goaded by his conscience, Gar Private (Marty Rea) struggles to establish meaningful relationships, especially with his father, SB O'Donnell (Walter McMonagle), on the eve of his departure to America. In a production aimed primarily at Leaving Certificate students, the director, Alan Stanford, at first emphasises the more accessible elements of the knockabout humour between Public and Private Gar. Rea and Stewart are excellent, with Rea superb at segueing from clowning to the gravitas required for the poignant finale. Aine Ni Mhuiri underplays her role as Madge, the maternal figure the motherless Gar craves, and in this relationship Gar's tragedy has its most telling contemporary resonance for young Irish Men.

Declan Burke

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Sunday Tribune Review Philadelphia, Here I Come!

Colin Murphy of the Sunday Tribune wrote a less than favourable review of the production, and of the play itself. Perhaps it is unwise of Second Age to draw attention to this review, but as we have published all other reviews, it seems only right that we publish this one too. In fact it could serve as an interesting starting point for debate. So here it is verbatim as published in the Sunday Tribune on 04/11/2007.

Philadelphia is well past its sell-by date
Colin Murphy


THE year is 1964. Gar is going to America, and using a suitcase last used by his parents on their honeymoon. He opens it to find a newspaper from their wedding day, dated 1937. "A medieval manuscript!" he exclaims.
Brian Friel's play, Philadelphia, Here I Come! , is now older than that "medieval mauscript" was to young Gar. Like that newspaper, its value is chiefly a historical one. It is badly dated and largely tedious. Nobody under, say, 35, who wasn't already inured to it from the Leaving Cert, could listen to Gar relishing his private nickname for his father, "Screwballs", and not wince.
Similarly with the constant refrain of "It is now 16 or 17 years since the Queen of France. . .". The play is mired by flashbacks and exposition; characters consistently tell us more than we need to know; everything is made tediously explicit. Two scenes in particular jar: the hoary old cliche of reading a letter aloud; and the visit of Gar's relatives from the US, who appear as little more than a cipher for the vulgarity of wealth.
The split of Gar Public from Gar Private, brashly experimental in its day, now seems like little more than a device to allow Friel spell everything out. Though Sean Stewart and Marty Rea present a finely tuned double-act, the incessant banter between Public and Private is now more reminiscent of something on the Ryan Tubridy show than of a split between ego and id.
Alan Stanford's production for Second Age, aimed at school audiences, is uninspired but faithful. He marshals his cast well around Eileen Diss's literal set. Though the company is uneven, with some responding to the dated dialogue by hamming their performances, Aine Ni Mhuiri, Enda Oates and Andrew Adamson are particularly good.
There are strengths to the play, but its chief strength for students is now its weakness as drama: its conflicts are so glaringly obvious as to come with exam questions inbuilt: public and private; children and parents; poverty and wealth, etc. Today's Ireland is a restless place that couldn't give a curse about the past; this play is so firmly rooted at one point in that past that it has become an anachronism. Discuss.

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Sunday Independent - Review Philadelphia, Here I Come!

Emer O'Kelly of the Sunday Independent is one of the latest reviews to be published. To date all of the reviews have been uniformly good, and there is not much quarrel over the quality of this production of Philadelphia, Here I Come! ALAN STANFORD'S latest production for Second Age is Philadelphia, Here I Come! and a solid, competent, straightforward one it is. This is in no way pejorative, since the company's work is aimed mainly at schools audiences, and for teenagers seeing their first Friel come alive on stage, this is the way to do it.
Three of the cast re-create the roles they played in Adri­an Dunbar's production for ART NI several years ago, notably Marty Rea as Gar Private.
The others are Walter McMonagle as SB O'Donnell, and Conan Sweeney as Ned, the vainglorious "lad" from the town. All three have a fine edge, and Rea comes close to being superb as he postures, scampers, and mocks his own broken heart through Gar's last night in Ballybeg before he heads for Philadelphia and the doubtful joys of being the pampered and smothered son Aunt Lizzie never had.
It's 1964, and it will be a long time before he sees any­one again, whether it be the loving housekeeper Madge, or his faithless sweetheart Kate Doogan in her fine feathers as the local doctor's wife.
One of the joys of such a straightforward production is the recognition it gives to the exquisite writing, with every character drawn in fine lines that scream the agony of emo­tional nerve-ends stripped and put on display. And of course, the nerve ends between Gar and his father are a silent scream: "It's the silence that's the enemy," as Private franti­cally tells Public, urging him to the confidence of admitting need: for love, for memory, for hope. And no matter how often you have seen the play, the memories the father and son try to evoke, each living in a separate dappled past, break your heart anew.
Sean Stewart is an extremely good Public, and Aine Ni Mhuiri a good if somewhat pianissimo Madge. The cameos are almost uniformly good also, from Dearbhla McGuinness as Kate, David Heap as her father, Enda Oates as Master Boyle, John Olohan as the Canon, and Donncha Crowley and Dan Reardon as Uncle Con Sweeney and Ben Burton. Joan Sheehy, however, seems to be aiming for suppressed refinement as Aunt Lizzie when unrestrained vulgarity should be the order of the day. Roger Thomson and Andrew Adamson complete the cast, with set design by Eileen Diss and costumes by Leonore McDonagh: both are absolutely in tune.
Philadelphia, Here I Come! is at the Helix in Dublin and tours to the Everyman in Cork and the Pavilion, Dun Laoghaire.

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