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Jun 29, 2022Liked by JJ O'Donoghue

I feel compelled to make a few observations on Corcadorca's dramatization of Guests of the Nation. It was a weak, vacuous and generally pointless exercise which probably had Frank O'Connor spinning rapidly in Deans Grange. I've been fortunate to see all of Corcadorca's productions and this came nowhere near their established standards. The use of diverse locations in this production just did not work. The use of the Opera House was theatrically pointless - surely location should give something to the audience experience but this certainly did not. It felt forced and not engaging and frankly the acting, particularly one of the characters, was in keeping with those feelings of disengagement. The use of Triskel's old theater while Covid still rages was very poor judgement and I'm sure that a better ventilated space could have been found. One of our group of six left the production at this stage of the proceedings for self-protection as I would have myself but for the fact that I had contracted Covid earlier this month. I don't believe that this work was enhanced in any way by employing an all female cast and it felt like some sort of PC tokenism - my companions for the evening were female and were of like minds on this. It was a very disappointing experience knowing what Corcadorca have achieved over the past 30 years and as our group agreed, the only theatrical parallel we could arrive at was that it was Much Ado About SFA.

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