Dublin Youth Theatre

The Fall of the Second Republic – A Review by Ruairí Phelan

Posted on by Youth Theatre Ireland Young Critics

The 2020 iteration of Young Critics, has like most events globally, been deeply affected by the COVID19 pandemic. This upcoming weekend of April 17- 19th would have been our first weekend together as Young Critics.

So instead of bringing our group to Dublin for their first weekend, we will be running a selection of their initial reviews.

These reviews were submitted as part of their Young Critics application. As such, they represent the first steps on their Young Critics journey. We hope you enjoy them.

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The Fall Of The Second Republic. Photo Credit: Ros Kavanagh

Our third Young Critic is Ruairí Phelan from Dublin Youth Theatre. Here he turns his attention to The Fall of the Second Republic by Michael West in collaboration with Annie Ryan. It ran from Feb 24th and recently finished its run at The Abbey Theatre .

The Fall of the Second Republic by Michael West and Annie Ryan aims to cover a lot in two hours. Created in collaboration with the award-winning Corn Exchange, the play is typical of the company’s style (picture heavy makeup, exaggerated movement, and dark eyebrows drawn in symbols resembling a Nike tick).

Set in 70s Ireland the play centres on a threat to the much loved The Theatre Royale, and a plot to destroy it to make way for the International Banking Centre (IBC). When a protester against the demolition is caught and killed inside a mysterious fire at the theatre, and the government is linked to the blaze, there’s uproar.

In the aftermath, our heroine – journalist Emer Hackett (Caitriona Ennis) – investigates Taoiseach Manny Spillane (Andrew Bennett) and his colleagues who many suspect are linked to the deadly fire.

Confused? I was, and it’s all a little busy with so many topics, as the play struggles to find its central theme, jumping around heavyweight issues including sexism, abortion, corruption and Irish/British relations.

But there are many triumphs, and The Abbey lives up to its recent promise to better reflect Irish life and culture. Meanwhile the talented cast give impressive performances and effortlessly transport us to the 70s helped by Sailéog O’Halloran’s clever costumes and Katie Davenport’s wonderful set.

There are great lines, and delicious parallels to contemporary political post-election wrangling: “A coalition with the wankers?” laments one member of the losing majority party, “It would be like marrying your cousins.”

Leo Varadkar might agree.

Ruairí Phelan is a member of Dublin Youth Theatre and a Youth Theatre Ireland Young Critic for 2020.

Ruairí Phelan is a performer, writer, and proud member of Dublin Youth Theatre where he gained entry through audition two years ago.

Ruairí, 16, has been acting since he was six and acting up since he was born! His recent productions include Primo Dolce as part of DYT’s Members One-Act Festival and The Sleepwalkers — Dublin Theatre Festival and Pan Pan Theatre. As well, he is Assistant Director for two plays and recently won a week training scheme at The Abbey.

He’s a keen videographer and enjoys listening to podcasts and messing around in GarageBand. He’s a terrible dancer but gives it a lash anyway. Ruairi loves all form of theatre. He has too many favourite plays and writers to list but considers seeing any work an honour and is looking forward to analysing theatre in-depth to discover what works and what doesn’t. He hopes this will help to make his own work better.

Introducing  Youth Theatre Ireland’s Young Critics 2020

Posted on by Youth Theatre Ireland Young Critics

The response to Youth Theatre Ireland’s call out for Young Critics this year was phenomenal. We received 45 applications from youth theatres all across the country. The standard of application was exceptionally high and we were lucky to be able to select 16 young people with a broad range of youth theatre experiences.

 

We are delighted to announce our cohort of Young Critics for 2020.

They are:

Sinead Barry, Lightbulb Youth Theatre, Mallow, Co. Cork.

Cathal Brace, Griese Youth Theatre, Co. Kildare.

Marc Cheevers, Explore Youth Theatre, Co. Kildare.

Sarah Cooney McCann, M.A.D. Youth Theatre, Dundalk, Co. Louth.

Emma Corrigan, Monaghan Youth Theatre.

Harry Eaves, Mr. Sands Youth Theatre, Bray, Co. Wicklow.

Dylan Gallagher, Leitrim Youth Theatre Company Carrick On Shannon.

Heather Jones, Giant Wolf Youth Theatre, Tallaght, Dublin.

Katie Lacey- Curtis, Making Waves Youth Theatre, Greystones, Co. Wicklow

Caitlyn Morrissey, Co. Wexford Youth Theatre.

Ellie O’Connell, Activate Youth Theatre, Cork.

Lórcan O’Shea, Kildare Youth Theatre. 

Ruairí Phelan, Dublin Youth Theatre.

Mairead Phelan, Free Radicals Youth Theatre, Tralee, Co. Kerry.

Killian Reid, Backstage Youth Theatre, Longford

Kai Ryan, Griese Youth Theatre, Co. Kildare.

We’re especially delighted to welcome members from three of our most recently affiliated youth theatres; Mr. Sands, Giant Wolf and Making Waves Youth Theatres, who will have members participating on Young Critics for the very first time.

In light of the current health emergency with COVID19, we’ve had to suspend our annual first meet up of the Young Critics in April. We hope to bring the group together later in the summer and then back again for the Young Critics Panel in October as part of the Dublin Theatre Festival.

We’d like to thank all the young people who applied, and all the youth theatres who supported their applications.

In the meantime, we will be introducing you to our young critics and publishing a selection of the critical responses across the Young Critics blog.

First up we have Heather Jones from Giant Wolf Youth Theatre based at the Civic Theatre in Tallaght. You can read her very insightful review of Howie The Rookie here on the Young Critics Blog.

NAYD Young Critics Announced for 2015

Posted on by Youth Theatre Ireland Young Critics

Young Critics Applications

Following our call out for applications at the end of January, we are delighted to announce that  the Young Critics have been selected for 2015. We received a huge amount of applications for the 16 places from across the country and we were able to offer places to a broad selection of youth theatres nationwide.

The Young Critics for 2015 are:

Thomas Caffrey – Droichead Youth Theatre 

Dara Eaton – Co.Carlow Youth Theatre

Somhairle Brennan – Letterkenny Youth Theatre

David Ronan – Co. Wexford Youth Theatre

Ryan Doherty – Donegal Youth Theatre

Vinnie McBrien – LYTC Carrigallen

Maeve Doyle – Footsteps Youth Theatre

Christine McNamara- Footsteps Youth Theatre 

Aisling Clark – Duisigh Youth Theatre

Marie Lynch – Backstage Youth Theatre

Niamh Elliott Sheridan – Dublin Youth Theatre

Niamh Murphy – Co.Wexford Youth Theatre

Maryanne Brassil – Free Radicals Youth Theatre

Aisling Sargent – Dublin Youth Theatre 

The first weekend of Young Critics will be happening from April 10-12 and promises to be an action packed weekend of shows, workshops, discussions and fun.

The two productions we will be going to see are:

Pals – The Irish at Gallipoli by ANU productions, at the National Museum of Ireland, Collins Barracks. Directed by Louise Lowe.

And

Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare, at the Gate Theatre. Directed by Wayne Jordan.

Under the watchful eye of Dr. Karen Fricker and NAYD’s Alan King, the Young Critics will be guided through the elements of theatre and the art of criticism.

We will be keeping you posted about this year’s Young Critics as it happens.

SWING SWUNG INTO ACTION FROM THE FIRST WORD

Posted on by Youth Theatre Ireland Young Critics

In the run up to NAYD’s Young Critics Panel on Oct 5th as part of the Dublin Theatre Festival, we will be publishing a series of reviews from the Young Critics.

Over the summer months we asked the Young Critics to attend some shows in their own home venue. We asked them to make a short vlog review of the experience. We then asked a selection of them to turn these into written reviews. Dr. Karen Fricker offered some editorial advice.

First up, Sophie Quin reviews Swing 

 

Swing by Steve Blount, Peter Daly, Gavin Kostick and Janet Moran, directed by Peter Daly
Performed by Steve Blount and Janet Moran
The Source Arts Centre, Thurles, County Tipperary, performance viewed on 26 June 2014
Review by Sophie Quin

 

Janet Moran and Steve Blount in Swing by Fishamble Theatre Co.

Janet Moran and Steve Blount in Swing by Fishamble Theatre Co.

“Is… Is this swing?”
And so from the first timid and engaging question put to the audience, Swing caught my attention as it danced into a familiar, yet new world. Not being a general admirer of dance shows (I find the lack of dialogue often compromises plot), I wasn’t sure what to expect, but I was pleasantly surprised by what I found.
In a swing dance class May (Janet Moran) and Joe (Steve Blount) meet for the first time. Their lives have stalled and they can’t decide what to do next. The class offers them an escape from the ordinary, to move on from the past, and possibly to live their lives anew. Drawing on the familiar issues of recession, divorce, emigration, love, changing your mind, and the omnipresent risk of failure, Swing retained a deep-rooted and quintessentially Irish style, as it mixed the serious with the comical and used humour as a possible solution to life’s problems.

Throughout the class we’re introduced to an array of characters: moody dance instructors, terrorised beginners, old lovers, and veteran swing dancers, each bringing their own stories to the stage. The actors swop characters multiple times by yelling “change places,” often at awkward moments; with a gesture, voice or posture they become a different person before your eyes. At times the transitions were so rapid that it appeared that there were far more than two performers onstage. Each character retained their own personality, even if some were slightly stereotypical. For instance the “foreign girl” was definitely foreign, and it was obvious that another character was homosexual from the cliché way they spoke and moved. Yet this was easily carried and probably necessary since there was such a varied range of characters. Blount and Moran interpreted each character with great flair. The direction by Peter Daly ensured the performance was crisp and elegant, but could also incorporate the gut-wrenching awkwardness of an argument taken too far. The show was funny but not tactless: none of the gags were out of context.

Fishamble has once again shown that it is at the forefront of new playwriting in Ireland. Swing is part of the company’s Show in a Bag scheme, in which all props and costumes are required to be kept to a minimum so performances can be scaled up to fill a large venue, or down to fit into a small tightly-squeezed café. This economical design meant, in the case of Swing, that focus was on performance and not an overly distracting set, which consisted of two chairs, a bag, a bicycle helmet, water bottles, a disco ball, and the costumes.
Whether you interpret Swing as an analysis of who and what we are rihgt now in Ireland, or as a jovial comedy about ordinary lives and the beginnings of friendship, it is a play that showcases much that is exciting and innovative in performance today. When the disco ball flashed into life, reflecting across the venue, I too was swept up into this ordinary yet extraordinary world. If you get a chance swing along to see this great and effective piece of contemporary Irish theatre.

 

Sophie Quin is a member of Fracture Youth Theatre in Tipperary and an NAYD Young Critic for 2014