The Guide: The events to see, the shows to book and the ones to catch before they end

Event of the week

The President

Previews from Friday, February 2nd; opens on Thursday, February 8th, then runs until Saturday, March 24th; Gate Theatre, Dublin; 7.30pm; €36.50-€56.50; gatetheatre.ie

Thomas Bernhard’s play, first staged in 1975, has been described as a theatrical masterpiece; the Austrian playwright’s work as a whole has been compared to that of Samuel Beckett and Albert Camus. This production of The President, a collaboration between the Gate and Sydney Theatre Company, in Australia, features the acting heavyweights Hugo Weaving and Olwen Fouéré as the president and first lady of, intriguingly, an unnamed country. Having luckily avoided a dual assassination attempt, the couple rage back and forth in what looks set to be a masterclass in acting. As for the president’s mistress, she’s in an adjoining room, playing blackjack. Tom Creed directs.

Gigs

Lambchop

Wednesday, January 31st, NCH, Dublin, 8pm, €27.50-€37.50, nch.ie

Lambchop, formed in Nashville almost 40 years ago (then as now the vehicle for the songs of Kurt Wagner), initially veered towards traditional country music, but over the decades the collective have shifted somewhat left of centre to incorporate a range of influences that include alt.country, soul, lounge music, jazz, chamber pop and electronics. This time around, Wagner – alongside producer Andrew Broder – presents a stripped-down piano-based show.

Nighthawks

Wednesday, January 31st, Workmans Club, Dublin, 8pm, €17.50, eventbrite.ie

Nighthawks has been running for more than several years, so kudos to the people behind this Dublin-based salon-type event for keeping it going – and for highlighting emerging musical and spoken-word talent. Tonight’s guests include the poet Anna Doran (recently crowned All Ireland Slam Poetry Champion), the comedian Edwin Sammon, the singer-songwriter Katie Phelan, and the tribute act Polythene Jam, who will play The Beatles’ 1969 album Abbey Road in its entirety.

David Gray

Thursday, February 1st, until Sunday, February 4th, Whelan’s, Dublin, 8pm (sold out), davidgray.com

Before White Ladder, his 1998 album, catapulted him into the mainstream, David Gray was by no means a household name – except, perhaps, in pockets of Ireland, which he had visited regularly between 1993 and 1996, plugging his early albums A Century Ends and Flesh. This week’s shows, which sold out minutes after being announced, see Gray return to where it all started: a jam-packed room, tough, uncompromising acoustic songs and a singer finding himself in a country that loved him before any place else. The cherry on top? Gray reunites with his two original bandmates, Neill MacColl and Craig McClune.

Dances Like a Bomb

Wednesday, January 31st, and Thursday, February 1st, Pavilion Theatre, Dún Laoghaire, Co Dublin, 8pm, €23-€25, paviliontheatre.ie

Junk Ensemble touch on a topic perhaps rarely broached in dance: ageing and care. “Some of us deny age, some of us pre-empt it,” say Jessica Kennedy and Megan Kennedy, the creators and directors of Dances Like a Bomb, which, as well as featuring in Dublin Dance Festival in 2022, was a hit at last year’s Edinburgh Festival Fringe (one review called it “surreal, beautiful and extraordinarily human”). The show, performed by Finola Cronin and Mikel Murfi, who impart courage, vulnerability and humour, by turns celebrates the resilience of mature bodies and explores the challenges of what can happen when youth begins to fade.

Literature/Ideas

Classics Now 2024

From Friday, February 2nd until Sunday, February 4th, various venues/prices, Dublin, classicsnow.ie

Classics Now, which is in its fourth year, features discussions, interviews, exhibitions, theatre, readings and film screenings around the art, literature and ideas of the ancient Greeks and Romans. Highlights include Trojans, a dance performance (from Company Philip Connaughton) that interprets Virgil’s The Aeneid (Friday, February 2nd, Dance House, 7pm); Conversations About Love, featuring a chaired discussion with the writers Seán Hewitt and Fiona Benson on the topic of desire (Saturday, February 3rd, Kevin Barry Room, NCH, 3pm); A Dialogue with Cicero, with Vittorio Bufacchi, author of Why Cicero Matters, and the Irish Times columnist Kathy Sheridan (Saturday, February 3rd, Italian Institute of Culture, 6pm); and Dido: Head and Heart, which will feature Dido’s Lament performed by the Irish mezzo-soprano Sharon Carty (Sunday, February 4th, Hugh Lane Gallery, 2pm). Full details are on the festival website.

Stage

Sive

From Saturday, January 27th, until Saturday, March 16th, Gaiety Theatre, Dublin, 7.30pm, €20-€40, ticketmaster.ie

“Blasphemous” and “ungodly” were two of the accusations against John B Keane’s play when it was first performed, in Co Kerry, in the winter of 1959. The play has since become part of the Irish theatrical canon. This production, directed by Andrew Flynn, aims to reimagine it while staying true to its core storyline of manipulation, avarice, pure love, distorted love and, of course, tragedy. The ensemble cast includes Fionnula Flanagan, Norma Sheahan, Denis Conway, Steve Wall and, as Sive, Sade Malone.

Musical

The Drifters Girl

Tuesday, January 30th, until Saturday, February 3rd, Bord Gáis Energy Theatre, Dublin, 7.30pm, €30-€55, ticketmaster.ie

Unusually for a jukebox musical, the real-life storyline of an ambitious music manager (Faye Treadwell, superbly played by the Olivier Award-nominated actor and singer Carly Mercedes Dyer) is presented with as much boldness as the songs. You know those Drifters’ songs – they include Under the Boardwalk, Save the Last Dance for Me, Saturday Night at the Movies, Stand by Me and There Goes My Baby – but the dramatic life story of the tenacious Treadwell comes as a welcome “I never knew that” surprise.

Still running

Andy Warhol Three Times Out

Until Wednesday, January 28th, Hugh Lane Gallery, Dublin, hughlane.ie

Few artists are as well known, or have had as much cultural impact, as Andy Warhol. This exhibition, nearing its end after four months, remains a must-see. It is curated by Barbara Dawson and Michael Dempsey and features up to 250 works.

Book it this week

Hamsandwich, Whelan’s, Dublin, March 14th, ticketmaster.ie

Kevin McAleer, Vicar Street, Dublin, April 19th, ticketmaster.ie

Ryoji Ikeda, Button Factory, Dublin, April 25th, foggynotions.ie

Jess Glynne, Heineken Big Top, Galway, July 24th, ticketmaster.ie