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IT’S THEATRE SEASON, darlings.
The Dublin Fringe Festival and Dublin Theatre Festival are due to take place next month with dozens of productions slated to take place in venues across the city.
With that in mind, we decided to find out a little more about some of the city’s more unique stages, from the oldest playhouse in the city to a theatre situated in the back of a bookshop.
Believe it or not, Smock Alley Theatre is technically the oldest theatre in Dublin. Although it did take a 225-year breather.
“Our theatre first opened in 1662 as a Theatre Royal under King Charles II following the restoration of the monarchy,” explains Conor Byrne, events manager.
It operated as a theatre until 1787 when it was stripped out and used as a warehouse to store whiskey barrels.
“It was then bought by the Catholic Church in 1811 and opened as a church in 1815 until it was deconsecrated in 1989,” says Byrne.
Prior to its long-awaited reopening in 2012, there was an archaeological dig performed in the main space, which uncovered a vast array of treasures, a small selection of which are on display in the theatre’s foyer.
“The original theatre would have had a dirt floor so there were a lot of items to be excavated including old bottles, crockery dating from Norman times (it is believed the theatre was built on the site of an old rubbish tip in the city), clay pipes and, notably, a Restoration period wig curler.”
Randomly enough, the most commonly discovered item were oyster shells.
The most commonly found item were oyster shells. Oysters were considered a very inexpensive snack to have at shows. So patrons could buy bags of oysters and slurp on them during the shows, discarding the shells on the floor.
The building is steeped in history, but the bell that sits atop the building has sparked some memorable events.
Since reopening, Byrne says that the theatre has been lucky to host all kinds of “amazing stuff” including events as part of Dublin Theatre Festival, Dublin Fringe Festival, International Literature Festival and others.
“Collapsing Horse’s Monster Clock starring Aaron Heffernan and Jack Gleeson [aka King Joffrey in Game Of Thrones] was one of the first productions we had,” he recalls. “It was fairly magical altogether and set the tone for the coming years.”
Smock Alley also hosts Scene + Heard, a festival dedicated to showcasing new work from emerging theatre artists.
Their main aim? To provide quality theatre that isn’t prohibitively expensive.
“It’s massively important to offer good theatre at an affordable price,” says Byrne. “There’s not much point in theatre if only a select few can afford to go. It is a medium that can profoundly change people’s perceptions on a whole range of things so you can confidently say it’s important to the fabric of a society.”
Tucked away at the back of Connolly Books in Temple Bar is The New Theatre, an intimate theatre space that has been plugging away since 1997.
How exactly did a radical bookshop come to house a theatre space?
In January 1997, founder Anthony Fox returned home from New York having landed an acting role in a what he calls “a ‘priest’ show” in The Peacock Theatre. It ultimately didn’t work out and Fox was left with a desire to put on a show of his own.
“Connolly Books in Temple Bar allowed me the freedom and opportunity to build a theatre and raised stage in a run-down hall at the back of their bookshop.”
From there, he never looked back. “A new socially engaged, artist driven theatre was born,” he says.
The New Theatre has been a part of the Dublin theatre scene for twenty-one years now. It hosts between 10-15 new productions annually and has become an invaluable resource for the city’s theatre makers, a place where people can feel “free of chains, free to express, free to challenge our society”.
Asked to single out any notable productions over the years, Fox points to the success of its most recent show.
“It’s said you’re only as good as your last show and The Harvest by Jane McCarthy is that show,” he says. Indeed, The Harvest had a critically acclaimed sold-out run and will soon embark on a national tour.
“What proves our worth are the many artists – approximately 400 annually – who we support in every capacity. Those, and the audiences of 12,500 plus that attend our intimate theatre each year,” he says.
Situated in the grounds of Belvedere College near Mountjoy Square, O’Reilly Theatre has been open for business since 1999. It is named for businessman Tony O’Reilly.
“As a former student of Belvedere College, Tony O’Reilly pledged to match funds raised by the Parents Association towards building the auditorium,” explains Aoife McCollum, front of house manager. “The balance was funded by Belvedere College.”
The plush 500-seat theatre was designed by Murray O’Laoire Architects.
“It has one of the widest stages in Ireland, a sprung floor stage and a hidden orchestra pit,” says McCollum. Not bad for a secondary school, eh?
Not only is the space used by students in Belvedere College, but it has also been used for everything from plays to talks to operas. Over the years, it has welcomed its fair share of luminaries with stars like Stephen Fry, Amy Schumer, and Judd Apatow all taking part in events there. More recently, the venue staged a high-profile production of Grief Is The Thing With Feathers starring Cillian Murphy.
O’Reilly Theatre also houses two additional spaces: No. 3 and Belvedere House. No. 3 consists of rental space for the artistic community with the likes of Oliver Cornet Gallery, Fishamble Theatre Company, Stoke Improv, Dublin Creative Therapy Centre and others all calling it home. Belvedere House is a Georgian building used for all sorts of events and, interestingly, once housed the classroom of a young James Joyce.
Known for its almond buns and pots of tea, Bewley’s is nothing short of a Dublin institution. For nearly twenty years, the iconic café has also become the home of daytime theatre in Dublin.
The café has always been popular with the artistic community with writers like James Joyce, Samuel Beckett, Patrick Kavanagh and Sean O’Casey said to have popped in from time to time.
“Mary Lavin famously wrote there and countless artists have made it an unofficial office down the years,” says Dave Horan, artistic director.
In 1999, the Campbell family decided they wanted to nurture this cultural side to the café and the idea of regular lunchtime theatre was born.
So how does it work?
“Doors open at lunchtime daily and you can come see a one-act play, usually comic in tone, and there’s often a lunch offering of a bowl of soup and hearty brown bread that you can choose to have while watching the play,” says Horan.
Tickets start from as low as €8 and audience members are usually out by 2pm and free to carry on with their day. Audience members range from day-shoppers and tourists to retirees or people enjoying a day off.
“It can be great for people who can’t come into town in the evenings – parents of young children, the elderly or people who commute from far outside of Dublin,” says Horan.
Over the years, they have put on shows by many of the country’s most respected writers.
“Mark O’Halloran wrote two plays for the Bewley’s Café Theatre starting out and in them you can see the prototypes for the characters Adam and Paul in his superb movie,” points out Horan.
We pride ourselves on showcasing great acting talent, young and old. We’ve had the likes of Seana Kerslake, Ian Lloyd Anderson, Tom Hickey, Clare Barrett, Des Keogh and Barbara Brennan and many others on our stage and audiences get to see quality filmic acting up close as the theatre is such an intimate space.
45% of the population is paying tax for
100% of the population , how about an article on that
@B-bob: I know, 55% so piss poorly paid they’re not in the tax net. What hope is there for a sustainable society with those kind of statistics.
@B-bob: Stating the obvious when around 50% of the population are either children or pensioners.
@Revolting Peasant: Those figures are off, few if any non nationals recognise the necessary to get involved with information by it The CSO of whoever. They like to bring their relatives etc to work for awfully low money. If you can snare an illegal you can pay way below the minimum wage, nor they want fair treatment on employment but they don’t practice it themselves. Now that is an area of exploitation I would like to see exposed.
@Revolting Peasant: well said. The so called middle income earners and wealth y like to think they keep us all in existence.
@B-bob: Misleading because when indirect taxes are taken account of, the bottom 10% pay the same percentage of their income (27-9%) in tax.
@Rosa Parks: The same percentage as the top 10% .
OR on the positive side – “90% of workers earn more than minimum wage!”
@John Flood: after tax there’s alot of workers on minimum wage don’t trust any government figures there records are useless to say the least!
@Gerard Heery: You might be on to something there; not trusting any government figures and being on the minimum wage are clearly correlated. Wearing a tin hat to interviews might be a factor..
@Gerard Heery: If we had a flat tax, household earners up to perhaps 30K would not pay any taxes. But that would be progressive and we aren’t progressive when it takes 21 years to get a new children’s hospital, are we?
@John Flood: There are a lot of people earning €10 or €11 per hour, just a few cents per hour more than the minimum wage.
Won’t this always be the case no matter what the minimum wage?…unless we introduce Communism. If we continue to focus on ‘the plight’ of those at the bottom of the wage league no matter what their ability or qualifications we will create wage inflation and make ourselves uncompetitive once again and push up unemployment instead.
Wouldn’t wage inflation create general inflation so there would be more money around?
@Fionn Bohane: this only works in an environment where you are not trading with other countries.
Wage inflation will increase prices and available funds WITHIN IRELAND. If prices increase in Ireland more than elsewhere, then we become less attractive for incoming tourists, incoming job expansions, and more Irish money leaves the country to buy cheaper foreign alternatives. We become less competitive relative to our neighbours. This has a downward pressure on economic activity and employment.
@Fionn Bohane: General inflation means that the money you have is worth less.
@Fionn Bohane: There would be more money around if companies paid their fair share of corporation tax instead of hiring acountants to dodge paying.
@winston smith: So we carry on as normal. What you are saying is yes they are miserable and poor but sure thats life. No sorry but that attitude will be tackled head on.
And working people can’t afford food
Why are you voting FG or FF
@Jonathan Yeo: Because there is no creditable alternative.
@Jonathan Yeo: yes no alternative.
I hate the brown envelopes corruption in FF/FG, but there is nobody else.
If SF got in I would be paying 70% in tax and would leave the country, its bad enough it’s already 55%. Yet people think you ‘deserve’ the high taxes as it’s unfair you worked that hard to earn a good living. Not to mention the amount of IRA terrorists still within the party.
Don’t even get me started on the AAA or whatever they’re called and the rest of those populist idiots.
@George Beckett: Ok your comment shows your are terrified of anything left. Thats good enough for me. They get my vote. Any party who upsets the estabishment gets my vote.
@Christopher Gardiner: I agree. I like to think I’m completely impartial, but in recent years time and time again I’ve heard only SF stand up for the rights of the people in this country in Dail Eireann. They wanted to burn the bondholders.. They want to abolish water charges. Them 2 alone are enough for me to vote for them. And if you really want to get into past crimes just look at what the current governments have done in recent years..
Dobby building nice new apartments, upon which he’ll pay no tax.
@Carl O Maoláin: What’s your point?
@Carl O Maoláin: How much tax do you think his business should pay on that property development?
@Obi: @Obi: B-bob reckons 55% of the population are not paying tax. They are living here, working here, paying taxes here every day of their lives. O’ Brien lives in Malta, pays nothing here. You know my point.
@Chef Harold: At least as much as Apple. Won’t he be creating employment for the 55% with his development?!
@Obi: Tax evasion. Thats the point/.
@Christopher Gardiner: tax avoidance you mean?
1.5% are earning under the minimum wage. So much for the moaners usual line that the drop in unemployment is all due to cheap job-activation schemes. At a maximum, only 3% of the 50% drop in unemployment can be explained by such schemes.
@Michael Doyle:are you that slow. Did you ever do a ce scheme of jobbride only to finish and be Forced by social welfare to go back on a meaningless cheap ce scheme and jobbridge. Then repeat year after year. Thats the people you call employed. 40% of those who work in this country are below the minimum wage.
@Christopher Gardiner:
Where do you get the 40% figure from. It seems quite specific, so I assume you can provide the source of the data.
My 1.5% figure is based on the survey describes in the article. 22,500 of the 155,100 on or below the minimum wage were actually below it. If 155100 is 10%, then 22,500 is 1.5%.
I’m sure it’s way more than that… and what about the people working on 0 contracts… a complete joke..
Everything is getting more expensive and the wages are getting worse. It’s an employer’s market , our health care sucks unless you are unemployed too.. you can rent or buy a house where you want to live, you’re borderline better off on the Labour than take a minimum wage or even a Euro more, rent allowance, medical card and free. College education. Country is messed up. People who are willing to work for 10 Euro or less should be rewarded with options of free education and reduced health care
@Alan Nolan: remember when you used to work and pay prsi and get healthcare too. People blaming the unemployed because the government have taken everything away bit by bit just let’s their incompetence of the hook.
@Dave Thomas: Isn’t it amazing that those who never were unfortunate to end up unemployed are the first out of the box to tell everyone the wonderful free life they have. Try living on the Fuc*ing dole and pay a mortgage and bills on 188 euro a week. They make me sick. I worked for 30 years before unemployment and its a meaning drudgery of a life depending on social welfare and Fianna Gael made life on social welfare beyond unbearable and cruel by cutting hundreds of supports overnight. Joan Burton alone destroyed the social welfare system that was built up over years. Remember you might be working now like I was but you have no idea what lies around the corner. Wait until the day you are facing a sign that says Entreo office Thats the day your life ends. They will make it their mission to destroy your life. No matter what you contributed to the system you will be treated the same as if you never worked and have to come on here and see people calling you sc^m for being unemployed. Thats the worst part. Looking at comments from people who never had to face social welfare on their high horse like saviours of the world. Be careful. Karma is a bitvh.
The spin on this article is so weird. They try to make it all sound bad. In the end of the day a large portion is part time and young people likely studying. They intentionally made it difficult to see the details. In the end of the day you will find very few people trying to live in minimum wage as the sole income to a household.
I don’t see why somebody doing an unskilled job that requires very limited education should pay above minimum wage.
@Kal Ipers: I am a student who works part time. I have rent to pay, transport costs, food costs, utility bills etc just like the rest of the population as well as having enormous fees to pay. Obviously this can’t be done on a part time minimum wage job so I have debt to pay back as well. Now tell me again how I’m an uneducated unskilled person who doesn’t deserve more than minimum wage.
@Caitriona Smith: Why would you even think you could afford to pay for college with a part time job? Just because you are going to college doesn’t mean your part time job is a skilled job. So yes I am happy to say you don’t deserve more than minimum wage unless you can explain your job requires particular levels of education and can’t be easily replaced. Skilled and unskilled labour has specific definitions. You can be a skilled cocktail maker but it is still classed as an unskilled job.
@Kal Ipers: A job is a job. And a human being is a human being. You sound like a greedy employer looking for any excuse to cut wages and people’s quality’s of life. shame on you
@UpThereAndHereAsWell: Payment for jobs is determined by avilaibility of capable workers. You are suggesting somebody flipping burgers should get paid the same as a doctor. No need to cut wages they are minimum wage jobs and the least payment allowable. Are you going to pay more for everything to deal with wage increases? Stop going to businesses that pay minimum wage?
@Kal Ipers commented: Just because someone doesn’t have a 3rd level education doesn’t mean they should be paid a crap wage. The minimum wage is set too low. I would like to see it at €12 p.h. Everybody’s job is important otherwise the position wouldn’t be there.
@Caitriona Smith: agree, everyone deserves a decent standard of living and it is impossible to have one on minimum wage or slightly above. Doesn’t matter what the level of skill is, all work is valuable, there’s a lot of people making obscene money just because they award outrageous salaries to themselves.
What are the figures for . private and public sector on minimum wage?
I would like a record kept of who the minimum wage paying employers are and for this to be public knowledge.
Also employers who use zero hour contracts need to be charge extra tax for doing so – to offset the cost to the human taxpayer.
@mursim: how do you not know already?Most retail jobs, fast-food staff, bar staff,cleaners etc… Are you going to stop using them now? Zero hour contracts have their place and have been in use for decades. Any venue has to use staff like that as the work isn’t consistent. One week the place is booked everyday and the next only one booking. Do you expect them to keep staff paid the same?
How are the CSO at maths?
@xor: Or maybe better question, how are they at honesty?
This blog shows that the bottom 10% pay more as a percentage of their income in tax including Income tax/PRSI/VAT/USC/ than the next 3 deciles individually. http://www.ronanlyons.com/2012/04/10/paying-tax-in-ireland-where-the-richest-and-poorest-pay/
And the disgusting thing about Fianna Gael is they use these figures to justify their evil existence in government. Jobs not worth a F**k. 2 bit employment with no right or proper pay. Thats what Fianna Gael calls jobs and they use fake figures to justify lies. Thats the Fianna Gael way. Lie through your teeth because they believe the Irish are dopes and believe them. Some of have ye well copped on. With your two bit job schemes taking people off the live register for 6 weeks on so called schemes to keep your buddies in jobs in training centres and those people leave with Zero from these so called schemes.
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