The opening performance of Mrs Warren's Profession by George Bernard Shaw attracts a house full of actors, writers and all-round culture vultures. The play was banned when it was written in 1894. Tonight it commemorates the 50th anniversary of the playwright's death, running at the Peacock Theatre until Saturday, July 8th.
Racing in out of the rain, Jack Gilligan, Dublin Corporation arts officer, is just in time. As he settles himself for the play, he whispers that "the biggest thing to hit the city" is about to happen next month. He explains that the Dublin Writers' Festival runs over three days from Thursday, June 15th next. It will involve almost 50 writers including Doris Lessing and Pat Barker. Later in the summer, Ben Barnes, artistic director of the Abbey Theatre and his wife, Julia Lane, explain that they plan to travel to the Moravian Mountains in the Czech Republic for the baptism of their two little girls Elishka and Milena. "Forty of our friends are coming along with us," says Barnes. Fiach Mac Conghail, cultural director of the world trade fair Expo 2000 and his wife, actor Brid Ni Neachtain, have just "whizzed back" from the Island Festival in Washington DC. uiseacht, - "for orchestra and bodhran".
Stephen Sensbach, a German cellist with the National Symphony Orchestra, says the play is "wonderful" because "it could have been written last year rather than 100 years ago".