Dr Tom Walsh lecture cancelled at short notice as Shaw returns to UK
DISAPPOINTMENT and surprise greeted a decision by Wexford Festival Opera to cancel the annual Dr. Tom Walsh lecture which was to be delivered this year by the award-winning actress and director Fiona Shaw who directed the opening night production of ‘Medea’.
The festival had to contact patrons the day before to tell them them that the much-anticipated talk, named in honour of the Festival founder, was not going ahead in Clayton Whites Hotel on Saturday morning at 11 a.m. as advertised, and was not being rescheduled.
The cancellation took many people by surprise, particularly as tickets had been available for sale online on the Opera Festival’s booking website up to the night before .
A Festival spokesperson said Ms. Shaw had to travel back to London at short notice after being contacted and told that her filming schedule had changed. She tried to negotiate her way around in order to be able to deliver the lecture it but that wasn’t possible.
On Friday, Festival personnel were able to make contact with most patrons who had purchased tickets to inform them of the cancellation. Festival rep- resentatives also went to the hotel on Saturday morning to meet the small number of people who did turn up and tell them in person. A refund was offered on the tickets.
Ms. Shaw, a renowned actress and opera director, was due to talk about Medea during the lecture which is a popular non-operatic event of the festival. She has played the title role of Medea in theatre productions in the West End and on Broadway and is well-known for her role as Petunia Dursley in the Harry Potter films. Her announcement as director of Medea was seen as a coup for the Festival.
It’s not unusual for directors to leave after the opening night as that’s when their contractual obligations officially come to end but Ms. Shaw had hoped to stay longer, according to the spokesperson.
As to whether she will return to Wexford before the close of the festival on November 5, the spokesperson said she hoped to do so but could not say definitely. The lecture was not re-scheduled for this reason.
‘It’s unfortunate but there was no alternative’, said the Festival spokesperson.
The Medea production was beset with difficulties as the dress rehearsal on Monday night of last week had to be cancelled due to storm Ophelia and the resulting electrical problems brought moments of darkness during the early part of the opening night performance in front of VIP guests, before a generator was brought into action at the interval.
Writing on this year’s festival opener in the Telegraph, critic Rupert Christiansen said: ‘Whatever one thinks of its excesses and eccentricities, Fiona Shaw’s way-out interpretation of Cherubini’s Medea holds the audience’s bemused attention and inspires a clutch of committed performances from one of the most vocally accomplished casts I have ever witnessed in Wexford’.
In a review of opening night in The Stage, George Hall commented that hurricane and electrical problems aside, ‘thre were other elements that might not have worked even in the better circumstances one hopes will prevail at later performances’.
Ms. Shaw was due to attend the launch of Wexford Film Society’s new season of Picture House films on Tuesday evening last but was unable to go as her schedule was said to have been blown off course by the extreme weather.