Comprised of two one-act plays, The Words Upon The Window-Pane (W.B. Yeats) and Riders to the Sea (J.M. Synge), Irish Shorts One is the first of two such shows in Theatre Alba’s Irish season running throughout the Fringe.
Words, the stronger show, focuses on a séance which is hijacked by the tortured spirit of Jonathan Swift, determined to make his tragedy known. Kirsten Maguire, in the role of the Medium Mrs Henderson, delivers a powerful and moving performance. She speaks Yeats’ verse beautifully and shifts seamlessly between spirit characters. Unfortunately the show is carried by this, with moments of intensity spoiled by the flat energy of some performances from the cast. Low energy and unchanging rhythm, especially in the opening ten minutes, made it difficult to be drawn into the story from the go. The pace does pick up with the séance in full swing, and the closing minutes left me with Goosebumps. Managing to offset the inability to achieve total silence in the outdoor venue, the ending held so much power that, if there was any ambient noise, I certainly did not notice. It is only a pity that this strength could not be applied to the full length.
I was rather unsure as to the story of Riders for a while, namely because I was struggling to hear. Many lines were mumbled with poor diction. This ceased to be a problem as the play progressed, but the damage had been done and I had to work hard to understand what was going on. Set off the coast of Donegal, we are introduced to a family which has lost nearly all of its sons to the harsh sea. Two daughters, Nora and Cathleen, suspect their brother Michael has been killed, too, and await confirmation while Bartley, the youngest son, braves the sea to feed his family. Clare Sheppard and Kirsty Halliday are utterly convincing as the daughters, while Jan Linton as Mauyra their mother gives a strong performance. Despite this, I felt somewhat alienated and uninvolved in the story. This could be down to the dated shock value of the script: when first performed, Riders offered its audience a fresh view of the sea as being something depressing, where before it was primarily viewed as mysterious and adventurous.
What was truly lacking was creative spark. Both plays are delivered in straight laced fashion, and though competent, lacked overall strength in execution to justify this. The emotive themes explored in the writing invite risk-taking for the staging, but the production felt altogether too safe.
