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Preview by Paul Nelson
ON THE eve of the play's centenary year, the Tricycle Theatre
is to present George Bernard Shaw's John Bull's Other Island.
Written at the request of WB Yeats and first performed at the
Royal Court Theatre in 1904, the play brilliantly satirises the
national stereotypes of Ireland and England, while not ignoring
the more familiar Shavian themes of capitalism, social power and
class.
Considered Shaw's first critical success, this rarely performed
play brought his work to a wider audience and established his
reputation as a leading dramatist, wit and social critic.
Property speculator Tom Broadbent, a well-meaning Englishman
drunk on the romanticism of Ireland, persuades his Irish born
business partner, Larry Doyle, to make a visit home after 18 years.
The purpose? To develop golf courses and an hotel in a backward
rural community. However, the pair get more than they bargained
for when they reach Rosscullen and Broadbent sets about a plan
to develop his partner's home and capture his girl.
Born in Dublin in 1856, Bernard Shaw was a firm believer in home
rule for Ireland.
He moved to London in 1876, where he became a founder member
of the Fabian Society.
After a brief spell as a novelist and music and theatre critic,
he began writing plays. Shaw wrote 50 plays in total; his principle
works include Mrs Warren's Profession (1893), Arms and
the Man (1894), Candida (1895), Man and Superman
(1901-3), Major Barbara (1905), Pygmalion (1913),
Back to Methuselah (1922) and St Joan (1923), for
which he received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1925.
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Director, Dominic Dromgoole, is currently Artistic Director of
the award-winning Oxford Stage Company, where he has produced
16 productions on tour and in the West End, including a co-production
of The Wexford Trilogy with the Tricycle Theatre.
Amongst these, he directed Three Sisters (tour, Whitehall),
50 Revolutions (tour, Whitehall), and Troilus and Cressida
(tour, Old Vic).
From 1990-96 he was Artistic Director at the Bush Theatre, and
in 1997 Dromgoole was New Plays Director of the Old Vic. His first
book, The Full Room, an overview of contemporary playwriting,
was published by Methuen in 2001.
Olivier Award-winning actor, Niall Buggy, plays Peter Keegan.
His theatre credits include An Inspector Calls at The Playhouse,
directed by Stephen Daldry; and The Weir (Gate Theatre
Dublin and Hampstead Theatre).
Alongside him is John Dougall as Tim Haffigan and Father Dempsey
(Hamlet, Love in a Wood and Macbeth all RSC,
The Henrys and War of the Roses, English Shakespeare
Company); Michael O'Hagan plays Cornelius Doyle (for television
Enterprise, for Paramount The Wexford Trilogy, for
BBC The Darling Buds of May).
Ewen Cummins plays Hodson (Arsenic and Old Lace, Strand, Bacchae,
RNT and My Dad's the Prime Minister (BBC) and David Ganly,
last seen at the Tricycle in The Cavalcaders, directed
by Robin Lefevre, plays Barney Doran.
He was recently seen in The Full
Monty (Prince of Wales Theatre) and The Contractor (Oxford
Stage Company).
John Bull's Other Island by George Bernard Shaw, Directed
by Dominic Dromgoole, Designer Michael Taylor, Lighting design
Matthew Eagland Press - Premier MaxWorks 020 7292 8386/8353. WITH:
Niall Buggy, Ewen Cummins, Michael O'Hagan, John Dougall, and
David Ganly. Presented by The Tricycle Theatre from September
11 to October 25 at 8pm (matinee Saturdays at 4pm. Note September
15 performance 7pm) at The Tricycle Theatre, 269 Kilburn High
Road, London NW6. Tickets 020 7328 1000.
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