'Godot' sees the light after a dark beginning

ARTSCAPE:IT WAS A CASE of waiting for . . . the lights to come back on. The Godotroadshow, the Gate's 40 one-night-only gigs all over Ireland, kicked off in Enniscorthy on Tuesday night, at Coláiste Bríde. The fit-up-style setting, and the town itself, were very appropriate, as it was there that Micheál MacLiammóir and Hilton Edwards first met.

Unfortunately, the electrical capacity of the venue may not have been able for the needs of a professional theatre lighting rig. A run-through that afternoon, enjoyed by the school's students, passed off fine, but in the evening the place was suddenly plunged into darkness mid-line, just after Alan Stanford came on as Pozzo. After an unscheduled early interval and hasty running repairs, the performance continued, making it a night to remember for all sorts of reasons. One of the, um, joys of live theatre.

Such hiccups apart, the Godot tour is a big theatrical deal, and Ulster Bank clearly saw it as such when they opted to come onboard. The bank seems to have cornered the market at the moment in high-profile arts sponsorships. Under the leadership of chief executive Cormac McCarthy, the bank's arts portfolio also includes title sponsorship of the Dublin Theatre Festival (DTF) and of Belfast Festival at Queen's. McCarthy has been delighted with the response from the bank's arts partners, saying, "You don't get the same level of active involvement from many other sponsorships". He describes arts sponsorship as a "no-brainer" for the bank, and he reckons businesses don't exploit the possibilities and benefits of the arts enough.

The bank's sponsorship of the Dublin Theatre Festival continues, and director Loughlin Deegan's top tip to people booking tickets for the festival (which makes money sense for theatre-goers even if it is a blatant commercial sponsor plug) is to open an Ulster Bank account, and use their personal booking agent to get 25 per cent off whatever DTF tickets are bought. The discount is paid for by the bank and the festival gets full whack.

After last year's celebratory year, the follow-up was always going to be tough, but the organisers seem to have upped their game, with almost as many shows this year as last, and box office bookings already 50 per cent ahead of 2007.

Up in Belfast, the funding shakiness of the past few years seems to have settled for the festival, with a three-year bank sponsorship commitment and small public sector funding increases meaning that the main planks of 2009's festival are already in place, a great position for a festival whose very existence was threatened last year. For autumn 2008, director Graham Farrow has nabbed some heavy hitters with the first visits to this island by two octogenarian legends, film composer Ennio Morricone and musical theatre singer Barbara Cook. There's also a Morricone retrospective at QFT, and contributions from Radiohead's Jonny Greenwood, Brazilian superstar Seu Jorge and The Swell Season add to a soundtrack theme. Theatre highlights include Footsbarn's carnivalesque A Midsummer Night's Dreamin Ormeau Park, reworkings of Antigoneby Owen McCafferty for Prime Cut and Cat on a Hot Tin Roofby The Corn Exchange, and visits from choreographers Michael Clark and Wayne McGregor.

Reluctant as we are to continue the plug, Michael Colgan is unashamedly enthusiastic about the Gate's Ulster Bank deal, controversially pointing out that commercial sponsorship has not been obliged to undergo the democratisation and egalitarianism that state sponsorship of culture has had to encompass. The notion that everybody can be an artist - a result of the growth both of celebrity culture and of community arts - has meant that no one wants to celebrate excellence, he says.

Commercial sponsors are not under the same pressure to be egalitarian, to spread support around and to be fair to everyone, and can just decide to back something because it's excellent, he says. Of course, they are in it for their own reasons (to sell more cars, improve their image, soften up Government in some way) - but, says Colgan, who cares?

Fringe secret is out

Round about Earlsfort Terrace in Dublin is one of the places to be tonight. Not only do Simon Rattle and the Berlin Philharmonic make their first visit to Ireland, performing at the National Concert Hall, but in behind the NCH in Iveagh Gardens, via the Hatch Street entrance - in what they're calling the Secret Garden (though it won't stay a secret for long) - the Dublin Fringe Festival opens tonight.

As well as the gorgeous Hennessy Spiegeltent, with two shows a night, and another two shows in the smaller Dutch global touring Bosco Tent, there'll be food and drink from noon at what is planned as a green space festival hub (free to 5pm, then a €2 charge without a show ticket). The move to Iveagh Gardens from Docklands was a big one, for the Fringe, and for the Dublin Dock Lands Development Authority, whose Fringetime anchor has gone from George's Dock.

Busy Lizzie

Lizzie Carey-Thomas had her work cut out for her when she travelled to south Mayo this summer, writes Lorna Siggins. A record number of more than 260 proposals awaited the Tate Britain's assistant curator's consideration for this year's 31st annual Claremorris Open Exhibition (COE). Some 32 artists made the final cut, and Carey-Thomas says she has been surprised at the quantity and quality of all the submissions. She is looking forward to returning to select the prizewinners when the exhibition opens at its various venues in the town today. The COE committee has invited Mayo TD Beverley Flynn to do the honours - she being no stranger to visual arts, having initiated her father's exhibition in the Linenhall, Castlebar, some months ago. See www.coearts.org.

A little further south, an artist dubbed "gamekeeper turned poacher" by this newspaper's literary editor last year, is preparing for his first solo in the Kenny Gallery, Galway. Modus Operandiis the title of Dean Kelly's show, opening on October 1st in his workplace, Kelly having been exhibition co-ordinator with the Kenny Gallery since 2001.

The Loughrea-born artist knew from early on that he had a particular administrative strength when working in his former job with Macnas, he says. He used to design, model, cast, paint and fit the street theatre company's distinctive large caricature fibreglass masks, but says he never travelled to meet illustrious clients such as Robbie Williams, Chris Evans, Boyzone and Tom Jones.

Out in Clifden, there's some small-hours activity for the annual arts festival, where Derek Mahon and many colleagues will celebrate 30 years of Poetry Ireland, and David Lorimer, former merchant banker turned philosopher and writer, will deliver the inaugural John Moriarty Memorial Lecture. See  www.clifdenartsweek.ie.

• "It is said that you get the government you deserve . . . we must be complete b*****ds." Sway gently as you despair of the Republic to the vibes of Dermot Carmody and Morgan Jones rehearsing The Taoiseach from Ipanema, their new, um, number on YouTube. They were to premiere the song last night in the At Last, The 1989 Show!in the Odessa Club, to mark the first anniversary of the musical comedy venue. On September 27th they're at the Ranelagh Arts Festival (7.30pm at McSorley's, Ranelagh). Carmody says the easily impressed may also be interested in his thespian foray in Under Milk Woodin Sandford Church, while Jones's voice features in The Ugly Duckling Mein the Cinemobile in Sandford School car park.