Playboy Of The Western World

Based on the book by J.M. Synge

Cast

Crew

The following has been taken from the original program:

The Story......

The play is set in a shebeen (wayside public house) perched on a remote hill top on Southern Ireland wild Atlantic coast at the turn of the century. It is the smokey shebeen that we meet Pegeen-Mike, daughter of the publican Michael James Flaherty.

Pegeen is engaged to the pious, God-fearing Shawn Keogh her second cousin; they are only waiting on dispensation from the church which will allow their marriage to proceed.

When a mysterious stranger appears out of a dark night confessing to the murder of his own father, Old Mahon, the locals are obviously astonished, none more so than Pegeen. Despite Her imminent marriage she falls in love with the stranger, Christy Mahon. But just how dead is his father Old Mahon...

Synge's play was inspired by an authentic story of an outlaw shielded by the people of the Aran Islands. The man concerned had killed his father with the blow of a spade before fleeing to the Aran Islands where the locals kept him safe for weeks inspite of a reward. This impulse to protect a criminal seems partly due to the association between justice and the hated English jurisdiction, but also to a curious local logic described by Synge himself: 'Such a man, they say, will be quiet all the rest of his life, and if you suggest that punishment is needed as an example, they ask "Would any one kill his father if he was able to help it?"'

However, as you will see tonight, this realistic foundation to the story sustains an extravaganza so wild that it subverts everything on which it is grounded. The naturalism of the play's setting, a shebeen, is merely a foil to the wild imagination of the peasants whose words and irony, black comedy and sheer poetry.

When first performed at the Abbey Theatre, Dublin, on the 26th January 1907, the play cased outrage. The most controversial scene occurring in Act III when Christy Mahon asks: "... what'd I care if you brought me a drift of chosen females, standing in their shifts itself....." The Audience erupted at the suggested imagery of Irish girls in their shifts (female undergarment). Patriots considered it a 'slander' on the fair name of Ireland'. Consequently police had to be called to the theatre to quel what has since been dubbed, 'The Playboy riots'.

Synge, however, was undaunted by the riots; he knew his play was drawn from life on Ireland's wild Atlantic coast. In the preface to the play he wrote:

'In writing THE PLAYBOY OF THE WESTERN WORLD, I have used one or two words only that I have not heard among the county people of Ireland and I am glad to acknowledge how much I owe to the folk - imagination of these fine people. Anyone who has lived in real intimacy with the Irish peasantry will know the wildest sayings and ideas in this play are tame indeed, compared with the fancies one may hear in any little hillside cabin. On the stage one must have reality, and one must have joy. In a good play every speech should be as fully flavoured as a nut or apple, and such speeches cannot be written by anyone who works among people who have shut their lips on poetry.'

John Millington Synge 1871 - 1909

The play is in tree acts. There will be an interval of approximately 20 minute at the end Act II when refreshments will be available. A licensed bar will operate on Friday and Saturday nights.

ACT I: A remote Hilltop shebeen on a dark autumn evening near a village on wild coast of Mayo.

ACT II: The following Morning.

ACT III: Late afternoon the same day.

The following list of Irish words may help and enhance your enjoyment of the play.

I. L. SOFT

SERENA HOWARD ~ SUPPLIER OF ORGANICALLY GROWN VEGETABLES

DAVE TOWNSEND WOODCRAFT

Actors get a taste for the part

Stonesfield drama group members are off to Dingle in County Mayo to polish their brogues and sink a Guinness or two. The group's next production, The Playboy of the Western World, is set in County Mayo in the early 19th century. The amateur actors were anxious to get it just right and decided some field work was necessary, so director Chris Bartle and six cast members fly off to Dingle today in a small plane piloted by one of the group. Mr Ian Keenan, said: “They aim to get the true accents of the shebeens of the time – and maybe some good beer”