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by Lennox Robinson, directed by Jackie Maxwell

Shaw Festival, Court House Theatre, Niagara-on-the-Lake

May 27-October 1, 2011

The Shaw Festival has a knack for uncovering intriguing rarities and Drama at Inish - A Comedy is certainly one of them.  It’s a perfect fit for the Festival, especially in its 50th season, since it concerns the effect of a serious repertory theatre company on the residents of a small town.  It’s thoroughly delightful and the Festival has given it a production that couldn’t be bettered.

The play from 1933 by Lennox Robinson (1886-1958) gives us glimpse into Irish life we seldom see.  We may know the peasant plays of J.M. Synge and the urban dramas of Sean O’Casey, but few plays show us the lives of ordinary middle-class people living in the small towns.  The scene is set in the seaside hotel in Inish run by John Twohig (Ric Reid) and his sister Lizzie (Mary Haney).  John is a prominent member of the local community and to boost tourism in the town, along with business in his hotel and store, John has sponsored acting troupes to play light comedies at the Pavilion every summer.  Unhappy with the low level of the humour in the plays the previous year, John has for the first time engaged a troupe of serious actors whose repertory consists only of the heaviest dramas by Ibsen, Strindberg, Chekhov and Tolstoy.  At first the town is fascinated by portrayals on stage of situations they never speak of--families and public figure with dark secrets and hidden tragedies and characters who take rash actions when confronted with the question, “Is life worth living?”  Soon the town in plunged into a state of melancholy, including members of the Twohig household, and bizarre happenings and the rate of attempted suicides suddenly increase.

The play is a gentle but very funny satire on the effect of naturalist drama on good-hearted but unworldly people where topics they view as better left unbroached are broadcast on stage for all to hear.  Robinson’s satire works both ways.  Much of the fun comes from the over-reaction of the good folk of Inish.  But Robinson equally makes fun of the pretensions of actor/manager Hector de la Mare (Thom Marriott) and his wife, the would-be grande dame Constance Constantia (Corinne Koslo).  One might think by the way the play ends that bourgeois values triumph over art.  But if you look at the the mechanics of the plot, it is clear that the happy ending that produces two new couples is a direct result of the actors’ visit.

There is no weak link in the cast and is yet another example of the ensemble acting at which the Shaw Festival excels, guided here by Jackie Maxwell, who clearly feels great affection for these characters.  Ric Reid and Donna Belleville give a fine portrayal of a couple who has lived so long together one knows what the other is going to complain about before the other even begins.  Mary Haney gives another of her deliciously comic performances as the scatter-brained Lizzie, who thinks it is only her constant attention to detail that keeps the hotel running, whereas Robinson shows us that she’d be entirely lost without the help of Helena, the maid.   Affected by the plays, Lizzie sees that she, too, has to bear with a hidden tragedy in which a man toyed with her affections, though the more she repeats her story the more we wonder how much of it she is imagining.  Haney is great at bringing out the comedy of a woman who finds suddenly that her life has more depth than she thought it had. 

The first pair of would-be lovers is Craig Pike as Eddie Twohig, Twohig’s son, and Julia Course as Christine Lambert, an accountant who comes up from Dublin twice a year to audit the business.  Pike is very believable as a good but innocent youth who can’t see beyond his Plan A (proposing marriage to Christine) despite the fact she always turns him down since she doesn’t want to be stuck in a small town like Inish.  Pike does a fine job of making it credible that his first exposure to de la Mare’s plays would bring out unpleasant questions in his previously placid, unquestioning nature.  For her part, Course does show that despite her repeated refusals of Eddie, she does have a genuine affection for him.

The second pair are the servants Helena played by Maggie Blake and Michael “The Boots” played by Andrew Bunker.  At we discover Helena is the only one of the characters who actually does have a hidden tragedy in her life.  Blake uses this to give Helena a certain brittleness that is explained when the truth finally comes out.  Bunker has a great scene when the otherwise slightly sullen Michael overcomes his shyness to audition for de la Mare.

Thom Marriott and Corinne Koslo provide the most obvious source of comedy.  Their grand airs and histrionic gestures and poses cover up the fact that they are merely itinerant players who haven’t played in Dublin for over 20 years.  Marriott gives us a man in love with his own resonant voice, and Koslo’s expressions of imperiousness, despite her diminutive stature, are priceless.  The unintentionally hilarious scene the two enact from The Power of Darkness shows that their acting technique has not really progressed beyond the 19th century. 

William Schmuck has designed a beautiful set to serve as the private sitting room of the Seaside Hotel--comfortable and tidy with just the right hint of dowdiness.  His costumes all look appropriate and lived in.  Hector and Constance, of course, give him the greatest scope for imagination and the fanciful capes and scarves he gives Hector and the elaborate gowns he gives Constance are amusing in themselves.  As soon as Hector and Constance arrive, bad weather descends on Inish.  Lighting designer Louise Guinand and sound designer Walter Lawrence create such believable effects of constant showers that it was surprising to find it was actually sunny outside the theatre at intermission.

No one will claim that Drama at Inish is one of the greatest works of Irish drama, but it is witty, unfailingly amusing and populated with the kind of characters who are, in fact, difficult to create on stage without sentimentality--that is, ordinary, kind-hearted, well-meaning people.  Of the five plays that Hector de la Mare presents in repertory in Inish, all firmly with in the mandate, four have never been presented at the Shaw Festival--namely, The Power of Darkness (1886) by Leo Tolstoy, The Father (1887) by Strindberg and, surprisingly, neither An Enemy of the People (1882) nor A Doll’s House (1879) by Ibsen.  If the people of Inish get to see these life-changing plays, why not the people of Niagara-on-the-Lake?               

©Christopher Hoile

Note: This review is a Stage Door exclusive.

Photo: Corinne Koslo as Constance and Thom Marriott as Hector; Mary Haney as Lizzie and Craig Pike as Eddie. ©2011 David Cooper.

For tickets, visit www.shawfest.com.