Players of the Western World
"It was with a loy the like of that I killed my father."
"You've told me that story six times since the dawn of day."
"It's a queer thing you wouldn't want to be hearing it and them girls after walking four miles to be listening to me now."
Druid Lane Theatre Company are rehearsing their new production of "The Playboy". In the dusty loft which serves as a rehearsal room, Brid Brennan (Pegeen Mike) and Maeliosa Stafford (Christy Mahon) are coached through the scene by Druid director, Gary Hynes.
The scene in question comes early in the second act. Pegeen, having come back in with the goat's milk, finds that Christy has had an early morning visiitation from the village girls and Widow
Quin. Pegeen Mike reacts testily to the intrusion and when Christy attempts to put a brave face on it by recountting, yet again, how he killed his father, Pegeen is not so easily placated. The scene is important because Pegeen Mike's jealous/possessive reaction to the presence of intruders is indicative of her growing attachment to Christy.
As the scene progresses, Pegeen deeflates the bluff and bluster of Christy by recounting a newspaper account of a hanging and how Christy with his "fine, stout neck" would be "a half hour in great anguish getting your death" from hanging.
Gary Hynes interrupts the action, first to go through the actual stage movements and then to ask the actors about their characters. She asks Brid Brennan if she thinks Pegeen really means all the horror stuff about gettting your death in great anguish. Brid thinks not:
"I only half believe it, I'm just using it because I'm getting into my stride and I'm trying to get at him."
Gary reminds both actors that until this scene flows clearly and easily, then they will not be able to get at centre of their characters. For over two hours, the cast work through the play in similar detail. By the end of the session they will have done their scenes maybe twenty times and got through less than 100 lines of the play.
In its seven years of theatrical work, Druid Theatre of Galway has built up for itself a justifiably very high reputation, Its most recent producc. tion, for example, Dion Bouccicault's "The Shaughraun" was alternatively described by the regular theatre critics as "one of the most intelligently innventive productions I have seen in the Irish Theatre in years" (Irish Times) or "the most exciting production of the year so far" (Evening Herald).
In July 1975, a group of people drawn from both An Taibhdhearc and Galway University's Drama Socciety founded Druid Theatre for a short summer season of three plays. At the end of the summer, three of those innvolved, Gary Hynes, Marie Mullen and Mick Lally decided to attempt to build a full-time, year round theatre in Galway. As Druid prepare, over 50 productions later, to take "The Playyboy" to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, it is clear that not only have they succeeded in building a full-time company in Galway, but they have also put together the most consistently original and dynamic theatre company in Ireland.
Initially Druid staged their producctions in the Jesuit Hall in Galway. Such was the pressure on the Hall that the company could actually get into the building to rehearse only after middnight. The sense of commitment, enthusiasm and caring which saw Druid rehearsing through the night has remained with them. Nearly all of today's company double their acting work with involvement in some area of production, be it stage buildding, designing or lighting or be it searching for the correct props. The day Magill visited Druid saw some of the actors involved in looking for props in the morning, rehearsing all afternoon, talking to American visiitors about Bouccicault in the early evening and then putting on The Shaughraun at night.
The Druid company is never much larger than 10 actors at anyone time and since for a period at the end of July the company was staging one production, "The Shaughraun", whilst rehearsing two others, "The Playboy" and "The Shadow of the Glen", then its clear that their high standards are the result of much pressurized work.
In their previous visit to the Edinnburgh Fringe Festival two years ago Druid, against the competition of over 400 other productions won two Fringe First awards and an Original Musical Score award for their producction of Gary Hynes' original work "Issland Protected By A Bridge Of Glass". For this visit, Druid have chosen two Synge plays, "The Playboy" and "The Shadow".
"These plays are not done often enough now ... We want people in Edinburgh to see them done properly and we think we can do them prooperly."
Gary Hynes does not develop the reasons why Druid can do Synge properly. But later, actor Sean McGinnley touches on something dear to Druid's vision of itself when he points out that through working on various Synge productions, the company have come to feel very familiar with Synge's vision. Nearly all the company were born in the West of Ireland and all have made a special commitment to working and living in Galway. They feel a certain affinity with the lannguage of Synge and to some extent their sense of being from the West helps them to respond to the vision of a former, different Ireland which comes across in Synge. There is no jackeen cynicism in Druid's attitude to their work.
Despite having played to full houses for most of the last two years, Druid face the second half of 1982 with the knowledge that unless their revenue can be increased, then they will not be able to continue their work on the same scale or with the same professional standards. The present Court Lane Theatre seats 110 people. Ideally Druid should be working in a theatre seating 300. Their present premises, a converted Granary (most of the conversion was done by the company themselves), are not large enough or flexible enough to conntemplate another re-design. Thus a furrther move has to be considered as an option. In the meantime, the question of commercial sponsorship, local or national, is being pursued. It is likely, however, that come 1983, the commpany will be looking for a sizeable increase on their 1982 Arts Council grant of £56,300.
If Druid are forced in any way to reduce their operation, it will be not only Galway's but the whole country's loss. In the meantime they will probbably have proved the point by picking up more Edinburgh awards with what promises to be a superb "Playboy". ("The Playboy of the Western World" will run at Druid Theatre, Court Lane, Galway, 11th - 25th August and at the Bedlam Theatre, Edinburgh, 30th August - 6th September. "The Shadow of the Glen" will be at Druid Theatre, lunchtime only, on 29, 30, 31 July and 5, 6, 7 August.)