Play set in tomb offers much food for thought

Arts Week with Judy Murphy

A group of concubines who have been immured in a tomb with their dead emperor and the drastic actions they take to survive forms the basis of More Light, a drama by renowned British writer Bryony Lavery, which is being staged in the city’s Nuns Island Theatre from this Thursday to Saturday, May 14-16.

It’s being presented by students of Core Theatre Group, and is the culmination of a 10-week performance course during which they learned a variety of acting techniques, including those developed by actor-director Michael Chekhov and mime artist Jacques Lecoq.

More Light is being directed by local theatre director Max Hafler, a Chekhov expert, who teaches drama at the Lir in Trinity College Dublin, NUI Galway, and at Core Theatre College.

This work was written by Lavery – who is best known for the play Frozen – with youth theatres in mind, says Max, adding that it was previously presented in Galway 17 years ago by Galway Youth Theatre. But in terms of its subject matter, it’s not really a ‘youth theatre’ piece, he observes.

“Lavery follows certain rules, in that it has a big cast with lots of girls and not many men, and some of the more difficult scenes are presented in a symbolic way,” he says.

In More Light, the females who have been locked in the tomb and left to die, range in age from six to 60 and are those concubines who have failed to bear emperor any sons.

But they are a resourceful lot who don’t intend to go down quietly and they decide to devour their dead master in order to survive.

After they’ve demolished him, they realise that the group of men who built the emperor’s tomb are locked in the space beside them. These men, too, become a food source, giving the women a larder for some time, explains Max.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.