Theatre group going back to Square One with new show
REPORTER DAVID MEDCALF FOUND ENTHUSIASM FOR THEATRE INFECTIOUS WHEN HE TALKED TO GERRY GILL, ROSALEEN VANCE AND FIONA KEANE ABOUT SQUARE ONE’S FORTHCOMING PRODUCTION OF COMEDY CLASSIC ‘THE CONSTANT WIFE’.
‘THIS is where the magic happens,’ declares assistant director Gerry Gill as he welcomes your reporter to a lean- to workshop in Kilmacanogue.
This particular spell is being woven at the home of former RTE set builder David Carroll, which is a comfortable modern bungalow. But inside the workshop, all the pieces needed to wind back the clock nine decades and create the home of a wealthy couple residing in the London of the 1920s are being crafted and painted and assembled.
‘ The set has to be absolutely top notch,’ insists Gerry, who has been spending a great deal of time in Kilmacanogue as Square One counts down to opening night on April 4. ‘ The Constant Wife’ is set to run for five nights at the Mermaid Theatre in Bray and the assistant director expects this re-imagining of a plush Harley Street sitting room will be one of the stars of the show, along with the human performers.
The building of such a substantial piece of work has called not only on the space provided by David Carroll but also his easy-going, good-humoured expertise. David worked for 35 years at the national broadcasting organisation in Montrose, erecting backdrops for the likes of ‘Fair City’, so he is not fazed by anything that director Fiona Keane and her sidekick Gerry throw at him. He recalls that his first two years in RTE were spent attending to the demands of ‘ The Riordans’.
The current set comes complete with a couple of settees originally acquired by Pat Dunne, one of the group’s most influential members, for a production several years ago. After the final curtain came down they were then retained by Pat for domestic use until the call of the stage came once more.
Somerset Maugham’s play, which was a big hit on Broadway back in 1927, has been enjoying something of a revival of late. It was given an outing at The Gate last year and Gerry hopes that Bray theatre-goers will enjoy the amateur version every bit as much as Dublin crowds lapped up the professionals.
He went to The Gate to find that the approach of Alan Stanford (yes, he of ‘Glenroe’ fame) was very much in keeping with the Square One vision of the piece. And he has also been boning up on Maugham, the intriguing English writer who travelled the world as a spy for the British government.
The playwright wrote short stories about life on remote Pacific islands as well as fiction set closer to his British home and he followed a conventional marriage by co-habiting with male friends. Hugely successful as a novelist, he was also able to turn his hand to drama and he had the precious ability of knowing how to amuse.
‘ This is not slap-stick,’ advises Gerry Gill of the work in hand. ‘ This is thought-provoking comedy. It is witty-funny, not laugh-out-loud-funny.’
He has been immersed in drama since the age of 16 when he was called up to cross dress as a woman teacher in a school play. Originally from Enfield, he joined Kilcoole Drama Group upon moving to County Wicklow in the late 1980s and transferred to Crois Dearg drama.
He finally settled on Square One about a dozen years ago after securing a part in ‘Witness for the Prosecution’, playing a lowly prison guard. He embodies the spirit of amateur drama, ready to try his hand at just about anything. If he can’t act, he will direct. If he can’t direct he will man the lighting desk, or sell programmes, or paint sets.
The cast members have been grappling with Maugham’s script as it charts the disintegration of a relationship. Those primed to amuse are Marian Walsh, Clara Lynch, Aileen O’Donnell, Sophie Keogh, Simon Maxwell, Caroline Hill, Ian Langton and Dave Butler. They have all learned their lines and all their moves over three intense months since Christmas in the classrooms of Coláiste Raithín.
‘ The aim is to be every bit as good as The Gate
or The Gaiety – we set the bar high for ourselves,’ says the assistant director. ‘ The facilities in the Mermaid make for a very good show.’
The fact that the audiences keep coming back for more leads Gerry to conclude that they must be doing something right. The group recently celebrated its 40th birthday, having come through four decades of great change in Irish society and theatre.
The 60 or so paid-up members of the current organisation include no survivors of the original group who came together in 1976 but the legend of how the name was chosen lives on.
Rosaleen Vance was there at the Strand Hotel on the Seafront at the start, one of a group of women looking to make a dramatic change. They all wanted a fresh start after losing interest in Cool On Players – going back to ‘square one’ as someone said at the time, hence the name.
Rosaleen reckons that the others present at the very start along with herself were Pat Kelly, Imelda Flood, Marie King, Mary Ryan and Triona Bailey. The Strand, run by John and Margaret Fitzsimons, was their base and the Little Flower Hall was their theatre as the newcomers staged cake sales to cover programme printing costs.
In due course, Coláiste Raithín represented a step up in terms of facilities but Square One agitated for decades to persuade the powers that be to invest in a proper venue.
Bray’s love of theatre has long run deep with stars such as Gladys Sheehan and Hugh Leonard treading the boards in an assortment of low key venues. Rosaleen confesses that she was thrilled when the Mermaid finally opened its slick doors in 2002 to put drama at the heart of the town.
‘We started the ball rolling,’ says Rosaleen proudly, looking forward to seeing the latest production by the organisation she helped to found in the theatre for which she campaigned.
‘ The current group is absolutely amazing – they are out of sight.’
To the fore in maintaining such a high standard is Fiona Keane, a teacher of drama who has been a leading actor with Square One for many years. Only recently has she taken up the challenge of directing adults.
She points out that ‘ The Constant Wife’ is just her second production with the group as a director, though she has plenty of experience elsewhere with a younger generation.
The students at the school where she teaches at Portrane in North Dublin are familiar with her calling the dramatic shots. She also produces and directs the children enrolled in her drama school in a Christmas show, presented on a shoestring budget.
However, she moved up the age range for the first time in 2014 when she commanded the cast in a one-act with Square One.
Then, having fully enjoyed that outing, she finally bit the bullet this year to direct a fulllength play.
Actually, her bullet-biting started last year, first persuading the group to take on the Somerset Maugham comedy. Then she had to put her backroom team together – an experience she describes as a real eye-opener.
‘We auditioned for the play in January and we have been rehearsing for nine or ten weeks but I have been working on it for so much longer,’ she says.
Fiona has been involved in one way or another with Square One since 1998, which makes her one of the veterans in the group.
She already had plenty of theatrical mileage on the clock when she joined, having been dispatched to drama lessons as a little girl in Stillorgan at the age of four. Her debut appearance with Square One was as an actor in the Bernard Farrell ‘Happy Birthday, Dear Alice’.
She reveals that she simply walked in off the street, having recently moved to Bray, and took an audition, landing a part.
‘I didn’t even know what play they were auditioning for. And I have been around most of the time since.’
That popular entertainment was presented on the homely stage of Coláiste Raithín, the venue which continues to provide rehearsal space to this day. Then along came The Mermaid, with its professional theatrical standards and Square One decided to take the plunge, with a collective nervous holding of breath.
‘ The Mermaid raised the game – Square One got bigger and it got better,’ says Fiona, who clearly has no regrets about the move into Bray’s town centre.
The mother of two – a 13-year-old son and an 11-year-old daughter – admits that she simply loves bringing a play to life.
Square One has never rolled its full length productions out on the road to compete on the amateur drama circuit which is the holy grail for many. However, the director of ‘ The Constant Wife’ believes that their shows are up to the standard enjoyed by audiences around the country and at the finals in Athlone.
She would not oppose a decision to take to the road at festivals but does not expect it to happen with an organisation which is comfortable and creative at home in Bray.