HAVE A LAUGH.

Cork Arts Theatre presents Bailegangaire by Tom Murphy
Time
Thursday, March 10 at 8:00pm - March 19 at 11:00pm

Location
Cork Arts Theatre

Created By

More Info
Thursday 10th - Saturday 19th March, 2011 @ 8pm

'Bailegangaire' - by Tom Murphy

Presented by Cork Arts Theatre. 
Directed by Sarah O'Dwyer.

Featuring Mary Healy, Julie La Fontaine and Victoria Kennefick.

There will be post-show discussions on Tuesday 15th and Wednesday 16th with the director and the cast. 

Written in 1984 during a recession this play shows an Ireland that we thought was lost but whose story is yet again unravelling in front of our eyes.

Bailegangaire tells the story of three women who are dependent on, and at war with, one another. Mommo, the dominating and tyrannical grandmother, is bed-ridden and attended by two long-suffering granddaughters.

Tom Murphy's dark, gripping reflection on disconnection, loss, and desperation is set in a rotting thatched cottage where senile grandmother Mommo is cared for by granddaughter Mary. The old woman was once a famed seanchaí (storyteller), and is now driving Mary to the edge by reciting the same yarn over and over again; a tale about a laughing contest in a town which subsequently changed its name to that of the title.

In her unfinished storytelling Mommo has the power to keep the sense of the past alive or finish the story and liberate both herself and her two granddaughters from the chaos and blight that hangs over them all.

"'Bailegangaire' pitches dark fragments of history against the possibilities of the future and the hope that comes with that. It is familial drama, thwarted by recession, grief and the confines of small-town rural Ireland."
- RTE Ten Review

"The speech is beautifully written, drawing on the language of classic Irish fireside storytelling, but almost Joycean in its intricacy."

- Curtain Up Review

Tickets are €15/€12. Group discounts are available.

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