IT was a busy week for Irish theatre in New York with Sebastian Barry's US debut of The Steward of Christendom opening at the Brooklyn Academy of Music's Majestic Theatre and My Astonishing Self starring Donal Donnelly, opening at the Irish Repertory Theatre in Manhattan.
Not only was Steward of Christendom greeted with huge fanfare and universal rave reviews, but perhaps more importantly on opening night last Tuesday the audience remained silent for several moments before rising for an unusually long standing ovation.
At Monday night's performance, there were calls for the author, rarely heard these days on the New York stage.
Accolades for the actor Donal McCann have also been tumbling across the pages of the New York newspapers, with superlatives including Ireland's Greatest Actor". At the party after the show, however, McCann refrained to comments on any of it, instead changing his hat at one point from a tweed plaid to a black woollen caipin. "It's my headshrinking hat," he muttered rather darkly, much to the amusement of Malachy McCourt, brother of Frank, who is busy at his computer these days writing his own memoir.
Frank McCourt, who has just finalised a movie deal for Angela's Ashes, compared the play to the genius of O'Neill's Long Day's Journey Into Night. The Brooklyn Academy of Music's president and executive producer Harvey Lichenstein, introducing a brief address by the director Max Stafford Clark, described the play as beautiful, evocative and full of feeling".
Also at the celebration was actor Chris O'Neill, who is currently shooting Sheetrock, a film about Irish emigrants in the Bronx, written and directed by Jimmy Smallhorne and photographed by Declan Quinn (Leaving Las Vegas). Carl Brennan, who plays the six year old son Willie in Steward was knocking back the Coca Cola with great gusto, assuring all around him that his favourite thing about New York so far was his trip to the top of the Empire State building.
On Wednesday evening, Glucksman Ireland House at New York University hosted an evening with Sebastian Barry, which was presented by John Lyons of New York's burgeoning Daedelus Theatre Company. Following one of the best notices run in the New York Times in recent memory, however, the event, due to start at 7 p.m., was already packed out by 6.30 when Bernie Burke of Ireland House had to stand on the steps to turn patrons and theatre lovers away with the utmost diplomacy. Inside about 300 people listened to the playwright's summary of his work.
On Thursday night, the theatre crowd ventured out yet again for the launch of My Astonishing Self starring Donal Donnelly as George Bernard Shaw, devised and directed by Michael Voysey. The Irish Repertory Theatre, founded by Ciaran O'Really and Charlotte Moore has been running now for almost eight years and has blossomed of late with the opening elegant new premises on West 22nd Street. The head of the theatre for the New York State Council for the Arts, Linda Earl, was at the opening as was John Timoney, former New York Police Commissioner, the Irish consul, Donal Hamill, and actor Milo O'Shea.