REVIEWS

On an Average Dayat Mill Theatre, Dundrum, The Turn of the Screwat Civic Theatre, Tallaght and Ruby Tuesdayat Bewley's Café Theatre are reviewed.

On an Average Day

Mill Theatre, Dundrum

SARA KEATING

On an average day, a father abandons his family, and the lives of his two sons are utterly transformed. In many ways, John Kolvenbach's play is an average American family drama, whose terse, tense, microscopic focus follows in the footsteps of Eugene O'Neill, Arthur Miller, and, most of all, Sam Shepard. But Kolvenbach is aware that there is no great revelation in a family's breakdown; that a father's abdication is nothing more the natural impulses of an utterly ordinary man. In fact, as the brothers reunite for the first time in 15 years, they discover that their father's failures are actually their own, and that the grim cycle of human fallibility will go on and on, sneaking up when they least expect it: on an average day.

Les Martin's damaged Bobby winces with vulnerability, but in a compelling performance, Martin mines humour from Bobby's foolish philosophies, and charms as well as commands our sympathy. Dermott Magennis, meanwhile, is stoically understated as the stable Jackson, but his own guilt and ghosts will crawl out from the rotting lino in the second act to haunt him.

In the grim arena of Martin Cahill's grotty kitchen design, Alan King's production unfolds with the eerie naturalism of an average day, while an audience waits for something to happen. King makes the most of the moments of the play's climax, although for this viewer the dramatic twist came as no surprise. But Kolvenbach's play is about the mundanity of human failure - the ordinariness of trauma, not its spectacular effects - and in the two excellent, affecting performances, the simplicity of this message rings loud and clear. Runs until April 12th.

Ruby Tuesday

Bewley's Café Theatre

GERRY COLGAN

Mrs T is an upper crust suburban housewife whose life has been difficult, leaving her vulnerable to introspection and neuroses. Ruby is the cleaning lady who comes every Tuesday, and adds dollops of common sense and realism to her routine chores.

Rose Henderson's play juxtaposes these two characters to some effect. Mrs T has children, but has lost two others. The trauma of that loss has unsettled her, and her executive husband is no help. If he brings her on an exotic holiday, he spends the time under a tree reading the Financial Times - he hates the sun - and neglects her.

She takes up various life-enhancing hobbies, from writing classes to yoga, but these are not the answer. The inevitable nervous breakdown surfaces, and its associated therapies are helpful. Throughout, Ruby's blunt commentaries on the subject of families and alleged friends offer quirky guidance to her employer. A typical stance taken by Ruby is that she's not a racist - just off-hand with everyone.

For about an hour, their short soliloquies and exchanges provide pleasant entertainment for the lunchtime audience, even if the play's structure is not quite sturdy enough to support the burden of psycho-analysis embedded in it. This is evident at the end, when Ruby suddenly reveals a tragedy of her own, out of synch and too heavy to be absorbed with the rest.

On the level of light comedy, the author has much to offer. There are neat alter ego tricks to exploit the possibilities of theatre, as when both characters become Mrs T, fending off false friendship in contrasting ways. And the actors - the author and the ebullient Helen Norton - hit the right notes to generate the laughter of recognition. Deirdre Molly directs. Runs until April 26th.

The Turn of the Screw

Civic Theatre, Tallaght

GERRY COLGAN

Henry James's famous novella has had numerous adaptations for the stage, and still they come, now into its second century. Liam Halligan has provided this entertaining new version for Storytellers Theatre Company. The opening scene, with the aged Governess telling her terrible story to an unseen friend, is somewhat redundant here, but it serves to get things started. She begins with her employment by a mysterious gentleman to undertake the care of his nephew Miles and niece Flora in an old country mansion. He does not wish to be bothered with any further responsibility.

So she duly arrives, to be greeted by the elderly housekeeper, Mrs Grose, and the two children. She soon senses that the house is haunted by the evil spirits of dead employees, Peter Quint and Mrs Jessel, who involved the children in their own corrupt relationship. More horrifying, she becomes aware that the children are making common cause with the spirits against her, and determines on her own kind of exorcism. The end is tragic.

There has always been a debate about the psychological status of the Governess, whether she is pathologically obsessed by her own neuroses to the detriment of the children. This avenue is not explored unduly, and we are left with a spooky tale of demonic possession. The adaptor directs the quartet of Ruth McGill, Deirdre Monaghan, Helen Delaney and Chris Patrick Simpson with control and sensitivity, against an effective set and lighting design by Marcus Costello. Runs until April 5th, then goes on national tour.