Dear Frankie

Pavilion Theatre, Dun Laoghaire Mar 14-16 8pm 13-16 01-2312929 .paviliontheatre.ie; Belltable Arts Centre, Limerick Mar 14-16 8pm 18/15 061-319866 belltable.ie; touring nationwide

There is great appeal in agony, as the late Frankie Byrne demonstrated for more than 20 years on the airwaves as Ireland’s foremost problem-solver. On her RTÉ Radio show, The Women’s Page, Byrne dispensed no-nonsense advice in her reassuringly gravelly tones like a woman who had seen it all. In some respects, she had. Beneath her good humour was a well of secrets, such as a 30-year affair and a love child, and in later life her bright passion was dulled by alcoholism.

Five Lamps Theatre Company, who have produced Niamh Gleeson’s play about Byrne’s life, performed by Nuala Hayes, seem to have come from nowhere and are destined for everywhere. Formed in 2007 to promote new writing and new performing talent, it has since produced four original works and widely toured two of them.

If Gleeson’s plays have a common concern, it is the lives of Irish working women, recalled with the pang of nostalgia. The network of the telephone exchange, the bustle of biscuit-factory workers and the crooning of the showband stars are postcards from 1960s Ireland, and here Frankie Byrne provides another barometer for that decade’s supposed innocence, anxiety and sorrow. “Dear Frankie, my boyfriend put his hand on my knee at the pictures and I’m worried I might be pregnant.”

Do we know whether to laugh or cry?

Can't see this? Catch this:Lay Me Down Softly, Project Arts Centre, Dublin