Keeping faith, touring all over

Despite the cutbacks in arts funding, Druid is set to celebrate its 35th year in style, writes GERRY SMYTH

‘NO RETREAT” was the motto delivered by Garry Hynes when she announced the programme to mark Druid’s 35th anniversary year in Dublin and Galway yesterday. While Hynes said the Galway theatre company would “continue to be prudent and responsible” in response to these difficult times, she was determined to deliver an ambitious and far-reaching programme.

She also said that it was important for a company that had suffered lesser cuts to “keep faith with the whole principle of Government funding of the arts” by bringing Druid’s programme to as wide an audience as possible. With that in mind, there are extensive home and international touring plans for all productions in the new programme.

The programme itself has three stands: a new play from Enda Walsh that reunites the creative team behind the world-conquering Walworth Farce, an epic undertaking in mounting the first production in Ireland for many years of Sean O'Casey's The Silver Tassie(the opera of the play by Mark-Anthony Turnage was part of an Opera Ireland season in 2001), and an eight-city, 14-week stint in the United States for Martin McDonagh's The Cripple of Inishmaan, to be followed by a home-based tour that will take in Dublin, Galway, Roscommon and the three Aran Islands.

While no cast has yet been announced for the " Tassie", which was rejected by the Abbey Theatre in 1928, the powerful and partially expressionistic anti-war drama will be directed by Hynes, who said it would be the biggest single production to tour the country, after it opens in the Town Hall theatre in Galway on August 28th. It will also travel to the Oxford Playhouse in Britain.

The premiere of Walsh's new play, Penelope, a contemporary take on the story of the faithful wife of Odysseus in Homer's Odyssey, will take place as part of the Galway Arts Festival in July. Plans are already advanced to take it to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe as well as the Stage festival in Helsinki.

Denis Conway, who created the role of Dinny in The Walworth Farce, will be joined by Karl Shiels and Tadhg Murphy in the cast of Penelope.

Druid's partnership with Walsh has already yielded both critical acclaim and two hugely successful international tours for The Walworth Farceand The New Electric Ballroom, which is currently on a world tour which closes in Sydney on April 24th.

To celebrate Druid's 35th anniversary, Hynes announced a show which will feature highlights from a selection of the landmark productions associated with the company, including Synge's The Playboy of the Western World,Tom Murphy's Bailegangaire and McDonagh's The Beauty Queen of Leenane. The anthology show, From Galway to Broadway and Back Again, will run for two nights, May 21st and 22nd.

The cast will include Cillian Murphy as well as Druid veterans Marie Mullen, Sean McGinley, Derbhle Crotty and Eamon Morrissey. Druid plans to invite the public to vote for their favourite productions and then include the most popular choices as part of the celebration.

Facilitated by Culture Ireland, Druid begins 2011 with the longest tour in the United States by an Irish company since the 1930s. McDonagh's The Cripple of Inishmaanis set to play in eight cities over 14 weeks. Ambitious and far-reaching indeed!