MIRROR, MIRROR, ON THE WALL, WHO’ S THE NEWEST PAN TO STAR OF THEM ALL?
THE catchphrase ‘Talk to Joe’ will take on a whole new meaning in December when Joe Duffy takes to the stage as the Magic Mirror in Snow White at the Tivoli Theatre. It’s the last panto at The Tivoli before the house is literally brought down to be replaced by a hotel.
Bluebeard’s Castle, an Irish National Opera production that ran for three days during the Dublin Theatre Festival, was an engrossing production of Bela Bartok’s only opera. A short work for soprano, bass and orchestra, it’s based on the horror story of the fiendish Bluebeard and the latest young woman he has taken for a wife. She will end up like all his other wives, dead and locked in his castle, despite her infatuation that makes her believe she can change him. There were superb dramatic and vocal performances from Joshua Bloom and Paula Murrihy under the imaginative direction of Enda Walsh, for whom the horror situation was not far from his plays.
The Nightingale And The Rose, an opera by John O’Brien that had its premiere last week at the Everyman in Cork, tours this week to the Civic in Tallaght (Tuesday, Wednesday) before moving to the Lime Tree Theatre in Limerick on Saturday. The opera is based on the children’s short story by Oscar Wilde about the nature of true love, happiness and sacrifice, as opposed to the shallow world of possessions. Wilde’s children’s stories show a much different side to his personality compared to those flippant quotations from his major plays.