"Dancing for Attention"
By Jordan Overstreet
Published: December 6, 2010
Theatre Sewanee’s recent production of “Dancing At Lughnasa” reminds you of that first Thanksgiving dinner at the adult table. Irish playwright Brian Friel, like your well-meaning mother, believes you will benefit from this time with your elders. At first you are thankful for the promotion, but once you are seated amongst a familiar collection of relics from the early 20th century with their constant overlapping chatter and never-ending punch lines that are foreign to your contemporary ear, you soon wish for a one-way ticket back the to kids’ corner.
The two and a half hour memory play is void of witticisms and bathroom humor necessary to hold the attention of a college audience. Instead Friel relies on the convention of storytelling as a means to reel us in. Enter Michael Evans (Michael Caskey), the narrator of our tale and illegitimate son of Christina Mundy (Genevieve Melcher), who recalls the summer of 1936 in Ireland and introduces us to the five women who raised him.
The Mundy family, consisting of five unmarried sisters, is headed by the eldest, Kate (Tori Nettleton), in the absence of their brother Jack; however, Kate’s rule is threatened by the homecoming of a Malaria infected Jack from Uganda. As a man of the cloth, Jack was once popular in the community, yet since his return he seems to have abandoned his Catholic leanings and, as Kate puts it, “gone native.” While Jack’s apparent defrocking stains the family reputation, this event is not the only dilemma of the summer of 1936. The summer also brings Michael’s father, Gerry Evans (Jordan Craig) and the construction of a knitwear factory, which threatens to destroy the hand knitted glove industry, the only source of income fore Agnes and Rosie Mundy (Katherine Izard and Rebekah Hildebrandt). Michael attempts to string together these unrelated memories of that fateful summer, suggesting this series of events will ultimately change the Mundy family dynamic forever.
“Dancing At Lughnasa” will make you realize how clever Beth Henley’s “Crimes of the Heart,” performed last fall, is. While both plays explore similar themes, including the familial bonds between sisters, and set the dramatic action in the kitchen, Henley maintains a stronger grasp on the differing personalities of her female characters, and, most importantly, she allows the audience to function as a character. By inviting us to take part in the action, be it sharing an inside joke with a character or witnessing a moment of desperation between two lovers, we develop a relationship with the personas we see on stage. We want to know who these people are and what they are going to do next.
Friel does not do us the same courtesy; rather he overpopulates his kitchen with five female characters, leaving the audience isolated and unable to find a seat at the dinner table. The Mundy sisters begin the play speaking their lines on top of one another and never seem to break this habit. We want to understand who these women are, but Friel does not let us get too close. While he makes sure to give Kate, who is expertly portrayed by Miss Middleton, her defining moment, he seems to have forgotten the other four sisters; thus making it difficult for these well-rehearsed actresses to translate their individual character’s motivations to the audience.
Take for example the flight of Agnes at the end of the play. While Miss Izard does her best to illustrate Agnes’ unhappiness in the Mundy home during the first act of the play, Friel only gives her three minutes of dialogue to articulate her feelings; and when it is later revealed that she leaves the family, her departure feels out of character and not believable.
The set, while beautifully decorated by Samantha Gribben, seems to further ostracize the audience from the action on stage. Taking up the majority of the stage, the Mundy kitchen commands our focus. The majority of the first act, which seems to last an eternity, is spent in the kitchen of the Mundy home. Because Friel does not include any scene changes or entrances of new characters in a timely manner, the audience loses its focus. The only break we have from the estrogen-charged atmosphere is the arrival of Gerry Evans.
From the moment Gerry gallivants across the Mundy garden, he demands our attention. With the help of fluid blocking from Pete Smith and colorful stories from Friel, Gerry charms both Christina Mundy (Genevieve Melcher) as well as the audience with his stories from the road. With the dashing Mr. Craig in the lively role, it is only natural that our attention would be pulled in his direction. However, while this scene is set outside of the Mundy home, the sisters never leave the stage and Maggie Mundy (Keller Anderson) is forced to maintain the fourth wall by watching their exchange from the envisioned windows of the home. Nonetheless, when Mr. Craig exits, we are once again lost and trapped in Friel’s scatterbrained world.
Despite its popularity in the early 1990’s and its Tony Award for Best Play, “Dancing at Lughnasa” seems to be a poor selection for such a talented group of young actors. Theatre Sewanee’s archaic reading of what some consider Friel’s masterpiece does not speak to a contemporary college audience, specifically the Southerners that dominate Sewanee’s student population. We have no knowledge of the Irish mentality; conceivably if we did, we would be better equipped to comprehend Friel’s vision.
Nonetheless, without being bribed by our English 101 professors to see David Landon’s annual Shakespeare production, students are unlikely to see a play at all. Perhaps is time for the Theatre department to tailor their future projects to a contemporary audience; these brilliant thespians deserve the opportunity to perform for a full house. Is it too much to ask for a production of a Tennessee Williams’ play?
