OPINION (AN COLÚN): There was nothing amateur about Tullamore's Shakespeare

TULLAMORE Amateur Dramatic Society created a little bit of history last month when they became the first group to perform in the outdoor space at Esker Arts Centre.
The outdoor space is designed in the style of the ancient Greek amphitheatres, with concrete steps as seating. All the seating was filled when we attended and, while the clouds darkened and became threatening at one stage, the rain thankfully remained in abeyance.
The word “amateur” is sometimes used pejoratively but there was nothing amateur about the TADS performance, which was infused with a lot of talent and enthusiasm.
It's a brave thing for an amateur group to take on a Shakespeare play, but their choice of play was inspired. Of all of Shakespeare's works, “A Midsummer Night's Dream” is probably the most accessible. It was written about 430 years ago and is bursting with fantastic humour, charm and emotional warmth. It's on many people's list of favourite plays of all time and when you watch it you can see why. The large Tullamore audience, when I attended, loved it. They were really engaged and often laughing.
Everyone in the cast did a fantastic job but there were some standout performances. George Ross as Oberon, King of Fairies, invested his role with a suitable sense of gravitas. He was also very good at enunciating the lines of poetry, some of which are exquisite and as pleasurable as a fine bottle of red wine, such as: “I know a bank where the wild thyme blows, / Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows, / Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine, / With sweet musk-roses and with eglantine: / There sleeps Titania sometime of the night, / Lull’d in these flowers with dances and delight.”
Frank O'Brien was excellent playing the buffoonery of Nick Bottom. A weaver by trade, Nick Bottom's head is transformed into the head of a donkey, thanks to the mischief making of the fairy Puck. Titania, Queen of Fairies, has, unwittingly, been given a love potion by Puck which dictates that she will fall in love with the first living thing that she sees when she awakes from her sleeping. The first thing she sees is the part man part donkey that Nick Bottom has become. In the words of the play, "Titania waked, and straightway loved an ass." She lavishes the delighted weaver with the attention of her and her fairies.
Mention should also be made of Damien Mitchell who turned in a fine performance as Puck. Puck is a very physical role and Damien was well able for the task. Puck's mischief making creates anarchy and chaos. As he says in Act 3, “Up and down, up and down, / I will lead them up and down. / I am feared in field and town. / Goblin, lead them up and down.” As he watches the mayhem he's caused he comments, “Lord, what fools these mortals be!” (A comment which has often been quoted in more serious contexts).
The four actors who played the Athenian lovers threw a lot of energy and skill at their roles. The audience loved the fairy-induced shenanigans of Síle Reynolds, Paddy Broder, Daniel Murray, and Gillian Harrington; no more so than when they started hurling insults at one another. There are many fantastic insults in the play, such as, “thou painted maypole,” “thou tawny tartar”, “You minimus, of hindering knot-grass made; You bead, you acorn”, “You juggler! You canker-blossom!” “Thou cat, thou burr! Vile thing”, “are not you he that frights the maidens of the villagery?” “hard-hearted adamant”.
Great praise should also go to the Director Fionnuala Corrigan, who obviously brought out the best in her actors, and to the costume and make-up team whose creations perfectly matched the otherworldly atmosphere of the play. There's a Celtic feel to this play (if we think of the word “Celtic” as meaning “magical”) and I got the feeling that the Costume team perhaps dug into their Celtic heritage when creating the costumes.
While we are laughing and enjoying A Midsummer Night's Dream there are also deeper themes working away beneath the surface; themes which have much to teach us. One of the play's great ideas is that real love is much more than mere physical attraction. The story of the four young Athenians makes us reflect on what an apparently irrational and whimsical thing love can be, at least when experienced between youngsters, and to reflect on the statement, "The course of true love never did run smooth." However, by the end of the play true love has triumphed, bringing happiness and harmony.