Laethanta Sona – a tour de force

REVIEW BY JUDY MURPHY

Funny, heart-breaking and utterly mesmerising – Samuel Beckett’s Laethanta Sona (Happy Days) on Inis Oírr as part of this year’s Galway International Arts Festival is an extraordinary experience, one that will live long in the memory.

When you witness Bríd Ní Neachtain as Winnie in this two-hander, superbly directed by Sarah-Jane Scaife, any preconceptions of Beckett’s writing being obscure or difficult melt away.

Mícheál Ó Conghaile’s translation and Ní Neachtain’s delivery make the piece sound like it was written in Irish the first day ever, while her Winnie captures the human condition – a person’s need to go on striving for meaning and happiness, despite being in dire circumstances.

Normally, in productions of the play which marks its 60th anniversary this year, Winnie is buried up to her waist in earth, with the sun beating down on her. We have no idea why.

Here at Creig an Staic, a rocky field on the south-western tip of Inis Oírr, her prison is made of local limestone, beautifully designed in ballgown style by Ger Clancy and crafted by local people. On a Saturday in September, the sun beats down, as per stage instructions!

The audience walks to the field from the meeting point, Áras Éanna Arts Centre, led by one of the large team involved in this stunning production.

We enter and see Ní Neachtain, head resting on her hands on the rock and that’s how she remains until she starts. Then she delivers a performance of power, tenderness, humour and pathos, the likes of which this reviewer has never seen. The wonderfully physical Raymond Keane as her husband Willie is there to respond – or sometimes not – to her many observations.

From the far side of the rocky mound, he makes an occasional comment and even more occasional appearance, but mostly it’s all about Winnie.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.

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