Multi-talented Frankie returns for ‘The Weir’

Arts Week with Judy Murphy

It weaves a spell,” says actor Frankie McCafferty of Conor McPherson’s award-winning play, The Weir, which will be staged at the Town Hall Theatre from June 20-25.

In this new touring production from Galway’s Decadent Theatre Company, Frankie plays the local barfly, Jim.

The Weir was first staged in 1997 in London’s Royal Court Theatre, when it won the Evening Standard, Critics’ Circle and Olivier award for Best New Play. Set in a county Leitrim pub on a stormy night, it contains a selection of rural Irish men whose evening is thrown out of kilter when a mysterious young woman arrives.

Eager to impress her, they begin telling stories, all with a ghostly element, until one tale is told that is more chilling and real than any of them could have anticipated.

Frankie has been based in Belfast for almost 20 years but will be familiar to Galway audiences his work in Druid Theatre while he lived in Galway during the late 1980s and 1990s. He made his Druid debut in Wild Harvest, later going on to win critical acclaim in Vincent’s Woods’ plays, At the Black Pig’s Dyke and Song of the Yellow Bittern, and in John B Keane’s Sharon’s Grave.

Frankie also appeared in all 58 episodes of the hit TV series Ballykissangel, which ran from 1996 to 2001, playing local rogue Donal Docherty. Subsequent TV work has included Rasaí na Gaillimhe for TG4 and Vikings for the History Channel.

He most recently appeared on stage with Decadent in 2011, in their production of another McPherson play, The Seafarer, which also contained elements of the supernatural. It was directed by Decadent’s Artistic Director, Andrew Flynn who is also in charge of The Weir and whom the actor describes as “relaxed but thorough” in his director’s role.

As Frankie unwinds after a day’s rehearsals, it’s clear that he’s relishing his role in The Weir which also features Garret Keogh as local businessman Finbar.  Patrick Ryan plays the barman Brendan, Gary Lydon is the melancholic Jack and Janet Moran plays the mysterious Valerie.

“McPherson is an outstanding writer and I really envy him because I’m a writer as well as an actor,” Frankie says. “He makes things resonate in a way that’s subliminal and you don’t even notice it at times.”

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune’