Put a Cork in It!

Phew, okay, lots of catching up to do! Last weekend I was in Wicklow and didn't have internet access (more on that to follow in a later post), which is why I got so behind with the blog. My apologies...

Two weekends ago, I went to Cork for the Midsummer Festival. I saw eight shows, so it's all a wee bit of a blur, but I will try and recount the experience to the best of my abilities.

Cork is a quaint little city in the south of Ireland. I took a bus from Dublin, which allowed me to catch some views of the green Irish countryside:

The center of Cork City:

The view from the hostel room in Cork. I didn't capture it in this picture, but the room overlooked a graveyard (creepy).

I was surprised that Cork was so gentrified and commercialized. St. Patrick's Street, the main road that runs through the city, has many of the same stores and restaurants as you would find on Henry Street- one of Dublin's more popular shopping areas. Often times, I would walk down a random side street thinking it would be quaint and small-towny, and find lots of different commercial businesses:

Okay, a brief summary of the shows I saw:

The Last Cargo Cult, by Mike Daisey:

The first show I saw. Mike Daisey is an actor/writer from New York who devises his own monologue shows based on contemporary issues. Fusing funny, angry rants a-la Lewis Black with a conversational and minimalist aesthetic reminiscent of Spalding Gray, Daisey addressed our culture's obsession with money. As I walked into the theatre, I was handed a 50 Euro bill (about 63 dollars). At the end of the show he told everyone that collectively we had been handed what he was paid to perform this show, and it was our decision whether to keep the money, give him back part of it, or give him more if we thought he deserved to be paid more. The issues brought up in the show itself were provocative, and although I think his speeches were a little long at times, I would definitely recommend going to see him in New York.

The post-show look for The Last Cargo Cult:

"Best Before":

An interactive show by a Canadian troupe. Each audience member had a video game controller. There was a big screen up and a video game called "Bestland," where we were each assigned a cute little bouncy ball character in a virtual world that was the society of "Bestland." We then made decisions collectively as a group- "do we want equal distribution of wealth?" "do we want to have an army in bestland?" It was an interesting concept, and it was fun to play around in bestland, but I thought the show lacked a cohesive trajectory/argument and missed several opportunities to really provoke the audience. It was most interesting to see how people responded as a group to some difficult questions about social issues, and I think this is where the show needed to go. How does this virtual society represent a microcosm of our own? What problems in Bestland are also present in our society today? If Bestland is a social experiment, then we should walk away thinking about what is says about us.

"Showstopper!":

Basically, an improvised musical performed by a British group of improv actors. Not different from the improvised musicals you might see in New York, but it was so interesting to me to see how references to American culture have a an "outside looking in" perspective. For example, when they made fun of Sondheim, James Dean, Jack Kerouac, or American fast food, I really got the sense of American culture being something separate and unique, which is something I don't really have a sense of when I'm home- something I take for granted.

"Plasticine":

A site-specific piece that took place in a huge, dingy, deserted nightclub that was set in a grimy, post-Soviet Eastern Europe. When we walked in to the space, there was a young man hanging from a noose in the corner. There were several spotlight operators waving spots from above us and all around us, making them seem like searchlights, like we were trapped in some kind of prison. The play was very disturbing, telling the story of a young man who is abused and beaten down by the world around him. The audience had to stand the whole time, and occasionally move to a different location. The actors moved through the crowd such that sometimes you didn't know if someone was in the audience or an actor, all of which created the effect of really being in this gruesome world. Although the world was very effectively staged, I thought a lot of the violence seemed to be there just for the sake of being there, as opposed to being used to tell a story.

"2 Dimensional Life of Her":

Perhaps the most interesting show I saw in Cork. How to describe it? There were paper drops on which a video of a paper world was projected. There was a cut-out of a woman's silhouette and a video projection of a woman super-imposed on the cut-out. The space was then riddled with pieces of actual paper, all creating the sense of an artist's messy studio. Eventually we learn that the woman is actually there elsewhere in the space, moving the paper drops at different moments. Everything was very well synchronized into a simple story- the claymation-like figures that come to life in the video break out of their paper world and burn the set down (in the video). They then rebuild the set upon the woman's command, to create the happily ever after. The piece seemed to be engaging in an interesting dialogue about what is "real," the artistic process, and the differences between film and theatre. The piece was only 45 minutes long, and seemed to be created so that children could enjoy it as well, which is somewhat unique I think.

"FML (Fuck My Life)":

A devised piece with 10-15 young teenagers from Cork. The cast played themselves, and talked about their struggles growing up, and about contemporary social issues like suicide, alcoholism, etc. The cast was very funny and entertaining to watch, although I do feel that they were a little stranded by their director and dramaturg. The piece didn't seem to have a narrative thrust- they just gave random anecdotes without ever building to anything. Also, I thought the pacing was terrible, and there were several unnecessary lags, which was unfortunate, because the cast was really great.

"From Away":

Another piece by Mike Daisey. This one was about his thoughts so far on Ireland and the Irish people. The script wasn't as developed as the previous show, purely because he started it when he landed in Ireland several weeks ago and is continuing to build the show as he travels around touring the country. I thought it was too much about his life, and not enough about Ireland, but again, probably because it needs more development. It was still entertaining, and definitely something I would consider going to in Donegal to see how it has grown.

"Cirque De Legume":

An amazing, hilarious clown show. Two Lecoq-trained actors used only a chair and a crate of vegetables to create "the most famous vegetable circus on earth." They basically used the vegetables to create the different acts: the horses, the Arabian knife-throwing, a circus seal. My personal favorite was the onion striptease. This was the first red nose clown show I've seen in Ireland, and it was great to see actors with such wonderful physicality. I'm hoping to interview at least one of the actors later on in the trip.

I also went to the bar run by the brother of the woman who attended the voice workshop with her dad in Dublin. He gave me a Bulmers on the house and was very friendly, just as they said he would be.

Another view of the river:

The river at night:

St. Patrick's Street at night:

The river (again) at night: