The tragic story of Eugene O’Neill’s sons, both of whom died by suicide. A four-time Pulitzer Prize winner and 1936 Nobel laureate, playwright Eugene O’Neill has reigned as the undisputed Irish American heavyweight champion of drama. His private life, however, was far less enviable than his career trajectory. At age 23, while living in a rooming house on Manhattan’s Fulton … [Read more...] about Sons of Our Shakespeare
Drama
North America Acts Irish
Community theater groups from throughout the United States and Canada converged at the Geva Theater Center in Rochester, New York for the 24th Annual Acting Irish International Theater Festival in April. The adjudicated festival, founded in 1993, consisted this year of seven full-length productions presented over five days, all of which were attended by Oleans-based theater … [Read more...] about North America Acts Irish
Origin Celebrates 15 Years
New York’s Origin Theatre Company, whose mission is to celebrate the work of Irish and European artists, celebrated its 15th anniversary with a gala party at Mutual of America building on Park Avenue on Monday, May 15. Norman Houston, the director of Northern Ireland Bureau North America, received the Origin Theatre Community Leader Award, and actress Orlagh Cassidy received … [Read more...] about Origin Celebrates 15 Years
Beckett’s Bodies
“Dance first, think later. It is the natural order.” These are the words made famous by the characters of Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot; characters who, Beckett delighted in suggesting, cannot move beyond their texts, never to experience the “later” in question. But what happens when dance is a vehicle for thought? When the body is infused with metaphor, filling its every … [Read more...] about Beckett’s Bodies
Mary Chase: The Woman Behind “Harvey”
The story of playwright Mary Chase and how the classic comedy Harvey was influenced by her Irish heritage. During summertime in cities and towns across the U.S., movies are screened outdoors. Scheduled for showing during the summer of 2016 at New York City’s Bryant Park Film Festival was a 1950 Academy Award-winning comedy based on a Pulitzer Prize-winning play – Harvey, … [Read more...] about Mary Chase: The Woman Behind “Harvey”