Theatre
Torch Players bring ‘Brighton’ to Belltable from October 17-19
Torch Players’ production of Brighton stars Bernie Hayes as Lily, Paddy Kelly as Jack, and Gary O’Hanlon as Dave, and is directed Daordre Minogue.
Torch Players bring Jim Nolan’s Brighton to Limerick’s Belltable Theatre from Thursday, October 17 to Saturday 19
Brighton is a thoughtful, poignant, richly comic and resoundingly affirmative hymn to healing and redemption by Waterford Dramatist, Jim Nolan. It explores that cost of hope, the need to willingly pay the price for another day, another breath, to stay above the ground, even if it is on a perilous pier of memories. Nil desperandum.
Torch Players bring Brighton to the Belltable stage for three nights only from Thursday, October 17 to Saturday, October 19.
The director, Daordre Minogue feels, “Brighton’s simple story about these three people is universal because the emotions portrayed can be widely recognized and appreciated. It is both a charming and uplifting play.”
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Set in a London nursing home, the play introduces us to three characters – Lily, Dave and Jack. The never-say-die widow, Lily Thompson, is determined to continue the miracle of life as a journey into adventure and write her life story, start a choir and help people with their problems.
Bernadette Hayes, who plays Lily, believes “Brighton celebrates friendship, hope and the resilience of the human spirit” and describes Lily as a “loyal, good-natured Catholic whose faith dominates her life and thinking”.
Lily is sustained by her daily pilgrimage to the shopping mall at Hammersmith Tube station, Fulham FC and the friendship of Care Assistant Dave Kelly played by Gary O’Hanlon.
Of his character, Gary said, “Dave is a kind, happy character who is an overly enthusiastic Arsenal supporter, openly gay and loyal lover of his less-than-faithful partner Enzo”.
But, the arrival of a new resident, celebrated actor, Jack Dunhill, brings them all unexpected challenges and new horizons. Jack, paralysed from the waist down is lamenting a modest career and a lifetime of regrets. Paddy Kelly who plays Jack Dunhill believes that “the random nature of Jack Dunhill’s injury creates a sense that life is illogical and arbitrary”. He becomes another lame duck for Lily to fix.
Daordre commented that although there are only 3 characters in the play, an interesting aspect of the play is that it is strengthened by description, and reference only, to a host of other characters whom we never meet but whose purpose is crucial to the action: the domineering Fr. Mackey, Dave’s lover Enzo, the ‘brandy-fuelled’ actor’s chaplain Fr. Bernard, Jack’s beautiful partner Alison, the flirtatious octogenarian Mr. Robinson, the incurably romantic Freddie and Dave’s loving father who struggles to come to terms with his son’s homosexuality.
Overall, Brighton is a thoughtful but funny salute to survival as a sometimes small but significant statement, where regrets are put aside and even hopeless cases have their time to shine.
Brighton stars Bernie Hayes as Lily, Paddy Kelly as Jack, and Gary O’Hanlon as Dave, and is directed Daordre Minogue.
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