Two Hundred Deer to Every Lion review: Part audio play, part tour of Phoenix Park, this feels good for the soul

Two Hundred Deer to Every Lion

Phoenix Park

★★★☆☆

Click. Crackle.

The sound of a cassette tape coming to life opens this play in the shadow of the Wellington Monument in Phoenix Park. The 45-minute experience from Bluehouse Theatre, written by Iseult Deane and Jack Delaney, leads a group of participants on a stroll through the park. It’s part audio play, part park tour.

After we are introduced to our fictional historian, Bláthnaid Brennan (Ellen Finnerty), and her imaginative interviewee, the Dreamer (Caoimhe Coburn Gray), the production begins with a bizarre description of the monument exploding into 1,000 pieces, alongside more accurate facts about the obelisk, and soon carry onwards into the park. Upon reaching the Citadel Pond, aka the Dog Pond, we listen to musings about Thomas Wharton’s foiled plans for a fort in its place. The Dreamer laments the absence of things that have never seen the light of day.

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Sam Killian’s sound composition invites the listener to feel a sense of grandeur among the trees, and in the final moments we see the Dreamer in the distance and hear a soulful duet. “Where do the hours go?” is its hook, which builds to a fitting crescendo.

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The play undoubtedly feels good for the soul. It inspires a sense of wonderment in the ordinary and demands a closer look at the park’s wildlife and history, regardless of how many times you’ve visited. But there’s a sense that it can’t decide whether it’s a factual tour of lesser-spotted sights or a dramatic exercise. Either way, Two Hundred Deer to Every Lion deserves credit for its ability to calm and centre its audience.

Afterwards listers are given cassette tapes. Inside are a dried flower and a nettle tea bag, so you can keep a small part of the park’s wildness back home.

Continues in Phoenix Park, as part of Dublin Fringe Festival, until Saturday, September 23rd