Janie and I are partial to a bit of Conor McPherson. We absolutely loved The Weir, but then you can’t expect a playwright to achieve such giddy heights every time.
Further, this was our second visit to the theatre that weekend, having seen the superb Dances Of Death at The Gate the night before – click here or below:
Dances Of Death by August Strindberg in a new version by Howard Brenton, Gate Theatre, 21 June 2013
So I suppose this particular evening was all set up for disappointment.
A wonderful cast, especially Ciarán Hinds and Caoilfhionn Dunne, plus a good script, provided plenty of entertainment for the evening – so in that sense we were not disappointed. It just wasn’t quite the jaw-dropping, mouth-watering night of theatre we had hoped for when we booked it. Greedy pair, we are, me and Janie.
Having been critical of the Donmar’s lack of on-line resource on many Ogblog occasions – I have now discovered (perhaps it has only recently opened up and/or was well-buried) a wonderful trove of Behind The Scenes resource guides on many productions – click here…
…including this production of The Night Alive, which I have uploaded and which you can specifically click here. Excellent resources – well done Donmar.
Below is a Donmar trailer, mostly talking about the music – interesting to hear and see Conor McPherson talking about his own work:
Click here for a search term that finds the reviews for this production. It was mostly very well received and transferred well. I’m glad. It deserved to do well, even though it didn’t bowl us over. We’ll still look out for Conor McPherson’s work, though – he’s a special talent.