New Mullingar theatre company ‘excited' about maiden show

The members of a newly formed Mullingar based theatre group say they are “excitedly nervous” about staging the premier of their maiden production in the familiar surrounds of Mullingar Arts Centre.

Téisiúila (spicy ás Gaeilge) Theatre Company was only formed by Mullingar natives Eimear Keating, Ben Thompson, Daniel Egerton and Sam Gilmartin following a post-show catch-up after Ben and Daniel performed in Rail Theatre company’s production of the Ibsen classic A Doll’s House in the Arts Centre in February.

Over a few drinks the foursome, who all cut their theatrical teeth in the arts centre before heading off to Dublin and London to attend drama college, decided, as director Eimear describes it, “to make their own work”.

Their efforts haven’t been in vain, within a few short although exceptionally busy months, Eimear and her three colleagues are putting the finishing touches to their first production, the Mark O’Rowe play, Made in China.

“We are having a ball,” Eimear told the Westmeath Examiner last week. “We have been rehearsing since June. All of us are working full time and right now it’s crunch time and we are really getting down to business.

“We are so excited. It’s really coming together well and we just want to get going.”

Although the members of Téisiúila are breaking new ground by staging their own production, Eimear says that process has been slightly less daunting by the fact that they will be staging it in a venue that was a second home for years.

“We all started in the arts centre. Not to sound sentimental – but it will be quite emotional. We treaded the boards here and now we will be treading the boards in a different sense with our own production.”

Eimear describes their upcoming show, Made in China, as unlike anything that local theatre audiences have ever seen before and it’s not hard to see why.

Written by acclaimed Dublin playwright and screenwriter Mark O’Rowe, Made In China culminates in a fight where two of the men take on the third, who has the advantage of martial arts training and the fact that he’s armed with a prosthetic leg.

Described as “a blackly comic drama set in an imaginary Dublin underworld full of martial arts, rogue cops and savage lowlifes”, Made in China was first performed at the Abbey Theatre in 2001.

The play has three male characters: Paddy (Sam Gilmartin), Hughie (Daniel Egerton) and Kilby (Ben Thompson) all of who enjoy a good barney.

Paddy’s weapons of choice are baseball bats and fists. Kilby (who imagines himself as something of an artist) prefers the skill of karate, which he practises on Hughie.

Hughie just wants to break the legs of the man who put him in hospital, and left him with one leg.

An accident sets in motion a violent tug-o-war between two of them over the loyalty of a third.

Ben describes his character, Kilby, as a “raging psychopath, an overly assertive alpha male who thinks he’s a lot bigger than he is”.

Kilby, Hughie and Paddy are, he says, “basically cartoons personified”.

“There is so much energy [in the play]. When we are going through it in rehearsals, things are clicking and everyone is a learning curve. We’re constantly changing and adapting [the production] and coming up with new gags.”

While the characters are larger than life, Eimear says that the action is underpinned by the sort of razor sharp dialogue that fans of O’Rowe’s films such as Transmission will be familiar with.

“Ben described it as more of a film that play,” Eimear said. “It should appeal to people who don’t go to the theatre that often and is nothing like Mullingar would have seen before.”

Eimear Keating is the director and the play is at the arts centre on August 23-26 (8pm).