1st Irish 2010, New York's only all-Irish theatre festival, runs from September 7 to October 4. Coordinated by the New York-based Origin Theatre Company, the month-long festival features a diverse range of plays by 16 mostly contemporary, living Irish playwrights, in prominent local venues like 59E59 Theaters (two productions), The Irish Repertory Theatre (two productions), The Mint, and PS 122 (two productions), among others.
Over 300 writers, actors, designers and stage managers from here and abroad take part in the festival's 26 separate cultural, educational and social events. Traveling to New York from elsewhere are Belfast's multi-award-winning site-specific company Kabosh; Dublin's highly acclaimed Guna Nua (with the 2008 Edinburgh Festival Fringe sensation "Absolution" by the Perrier Award-nominated
Owen O'Neill at
59E59 Theaters; they nabbed the 2009
Carol Tambor honor for another play "Little Gem"), and Tall Tales Theatre from Navan (County Meath) which brings Deirdre Kinahan's "Hue and Cry" to The
Irish Repertory Theatre. While in New York, Kabosh will transpose their highly acclaimed site-specific play about Belfast's Jewish community, "This is What We Sang," by
Gavin Kostick, to the Synagogue for the Arts on White Street. All three of these productions will be U.S. premieres.
The other U.S. premieres (of the 16 plays being presented, seven are U.S. premieres, and two are world premieres) include a forgotten Irish classic, "Wife to
James Whelan," currently at The Mint; "Exit/Entrance" by Aidan Mathews, at
59E59 Theaters; "The Holy Ground" by Dermot Bolger, at Manhattan Theatre Source; "Trans-Euro Express" by Gary Duggan, at
Irish Arts Center. The festival's world premieres include "The Prophet of Monto" by
John Paul Murphy, at The Flea, produced by Solas Nua from Washington DC, and "Graham and Frost" by Belinda McKeon, from The Sullivan Project in New York.
An Irish Theatre Symposium presented at the NYU Glucksman Ireland House, on Saturday September 25, features a cross-section of theatre artists working in contemporary Irish theatre, including the Tony Award-winning director
Garry Hynes. Another notable special event will be the staged reading of poet
Seamus Heaney's translation into modern English of "Beowulf" at The American Irish Historical Society on Monday September 27. Kabosh, the multi-award-winning company dedicated to challenging the notion of what theatre is and where it takes place, hosts a special panel discussion on Tuesday September 28 at The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts.
Other standouts in the schedule are "The Map of Lost Things," an inventive mixed-media concoction featuring new puppetry and live music by the acclaimed young playwright Darragh Martin. A revival of
Ron Hutchinson's drama about the Irish troubles, "Rat in the Skull," which came to The Public in 1985, is directed by and stars
Roderick Hill (Broadway in "Lestat" and "Butley"). Two interesting plays seen in brief New York runs earlier this year -- Ed Malone's one-man tour de force "Three Irish Widows Versus The Rest of the World" and "Guy Walks Into a Bar" written and directed by Don Creedon - will be restaged. This time "Guy" walks into a real bar, as Creedon and his team sidle up to Ryan's Daughter, a bar on the Upper East Side.
The third annual edition of 1st Irish concludes on Monday October 4 with an Awards Ceremony at which the festival's jury will honor the outstanding performances and productions, and a new Audience Choice Award for Best Play will be inaugurated. To see the schedule and to learn how to vote for this year's Audience Choice Award for Best Play, visit
www.1stIrish.org
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