Many Young Men of Twenty

Written by John B Keane
Directed by Karen Carleton
Performed in The Mill Theatre, Dundrum - 10 - 14 November 2009

The group's production of 'Many Young Men of Twenty' closed to an enthusiastic full house on Saturday 14 November 2009. This production proved to be a huge success and a favourite with audiences throughout its week long run in the Mill Theatre. It was a marvelous night out for the whole family with laughs and songs galore and something for everyone to talk over and argue about for days afterwards. It may have been about Ireland in the 1950s, but it resonated with young and old like a contemporary piece of social commentary.

Francis Cahill as Danger Mulally on the set designed by Gerard Bourke and built by Patrick Hand, John Carleton, Brian Dempsey, Mick Behan and Ronan Goggin.

The story takes place in the back room of a public house during the summer in 1950s Ireland. The location is Kerry, in a small rural village called 'Keelty'. While the theme has a sad undertone in that it deals with emigration and the lack of jobs at home, which forced people to leave their native Ireland for England, the tale is told with lots of humour and some music and dance.

 

 

On a July evening in 1961, a few hours before the curtain was due to rise on 'Many Young Men of Twenty, John B Keane was pacing the hotel lounge of the Imperial Hotel in Cork. His wife Mary was not with him, she was expecting their third child within weeks. John B joked, lit cigarette after cigarette and kept frowning at his watch. 'Don't mind me' he said, 'I'm always like this before a premiere. Tonight is a challenge'.

 

John B Keane had written a play with a theme close to his heart, emigration, a subject which he felt gave rise to political hypocrisy.

He had drawn on his own experiences in London and had highlighted the emigrants homecoming on holidays and eventual return to places and jobs they hated.

The underlying theme was the emigrants desire to share their life again with their own Irish people.

His anger with the political establishment who sat on their hands while bemoaning the fate of their people was and is palpable.

 

Written in the late 1950s, 'Many Young. Men of Twenty' may now seem on occasion politically incorrect. It was conceived at a time of real innocence and naivety and of some ignorance of the world outside of the 'kingdom'. His main character Danger Mulally, written for the actor James N Healy, is a man who knows Ireland, or at least knows Kerry. He knows our exaggerated faults and over-emphasised blessings and is unaware of the sensitivities of any 'other'. A man of his time.

 

An appreciation of the writer

A writer I admire very much is the late John B. Keane. I have many reasons for this choice. I will choose one - if a writer can create characters whom I can readily imagine I would know if I heard them speak, or met them out and about, or heard their voice, then that writer is excellent for me.

So many of John B. Keane's characters live in my imagination as if I had truly known them, that his ability to create them in all their uniqueness, is for me a sign of a gifted writer. If I walk in forests or in deserted places, pass by isolated farmhouses, see the mystical sweep of a mountain, the windswept loneliness and internal beauty of a bog, I often imagine the footfall of memorable characters as The Hiker.

 

If I hear the beat of a bodhrán, I am back in childhood in my local hall in Kilcavan, witnessing the drama of Sive, in her stage world, where the audience is spellbound in pity and in reality.

If I see suitcases or pieces of twine, I hear in ghostly crescendo the words of, 'Many Young Men of Twenty said Goodbye.'

 

John B. Keane in his myriad of characters in his plays, novels, short stories, poems and songs, had the gift for characterisation which is just one reason from many that I treasure all his books and return to them often, recalling the gentleman he was, and the great character creator he is in all his writings.

 

Ann Egan

Cast

Peg Finnerty Tom Hannigan Seelie Hannigan Katty Fitzgerald Aloysius Aloysius Óg Emigrants Danger Mulally Daheen Timmineen Din Kevin Dinny Maynan Mikey Din Mary Din Maurice Brown Anne Finnerty Dot (Dinny's Wife) Kitty Curley Kitty's neighbour JJ Houlihan T.D. Johnny Houlihan

Jacqueline Dooley Len Nealon Joanne Keane Stephanie Ruane Sean T Daly Óran O'Rua John Canning, Grainne McCarthy Francis Cahill Declan Brennan Joe McCarthy Gareth Murphy Mary Ryan Kevin O'Flynn Fiona Walshe Evan Jameson Claire O'Donovan Aoibhinn Finnegan Muriel Caslin O'Hagan Teresa Dempsey Tony McGettigan Oisin Gibson

Crew

Director Producer Set Design Stage Manager Lighting Design Sound Design Sound Operator Construction Manager Set Construction Costume Design Musical Directors Make Up Programme Design Programme Content Photography Crew

Karen Carleton Hilary Madigan Gerard Bourke Niamh Daly Paul Macken Declan Brennan Derek Green Patrick Hand John Carleton, Brian Dempsey, Patrick Hand, Mick Behan, Ronan Goggin Dympna Murray Jacqueline Dooley, Muriel Caslin O'Hagan Teresa Dempsey, Emma O'Hara xwerx.com Claire Reilly Declan Brennan Doris Cullen, Jean Monahan, Lorraine Hedderman, Orla Fitzpatrick

 

Picture Gallery

Photographs from productions are stored on the SmugMug.com site. The Balally Players SmugMug account allows for the viewing and downloading of images at various sizes if high resolution pictures have been uploaded. The slideshow below can be run and stopped by clicking on the play (>) and pause (¦¦) icons. You can move forward and back by clicking on the right or left of the image. To go to the gallery of these images stored in the Balally Players pages of the SmugMug site, where you can see and download larger copies of the images, visit www.balally.smugmug.com to see all of the available galleries of images.

 

Karen Carleton (right) directed 'Many Young Men of Twenty' at the Mill Theatre in Dundrum, Dublin from Tuesday 10 to Saturday 14 November 2009 in a very successful run that played to full houses of very appreciative audiences.

This work has been considered by many to be one of J B Keane's finest plays since it was first performed in Cork in 1961.

The emigrants' longing for home is very evident in the play - "Everyone is lonesome leaving home" - but their annual homecomings and their return to jobs and places they disliked are used by the playwright to draw some wonderful characters and present the richness of the human spirit in spite of their circumstances. Francis Cahill (left) played the lead role, Danger Mulally, in 'Many Young Men of Twenty'.

Some of the cast during a rehearsal for 'Many Young Men'
	Kevin (left) played by Joe McCarthy and Dinny played by Gareth Murphy share a brotherly moment where Kevin acts as comforter before they leave for England.
Peg Finnerty, played by Jacqueline Dooley, is the focus of attention for two characters who are rivals for her affection - the farmer's son Kevin and school teacher Maurice Brown. In a world where there is no such thing as a safe choice, the path Peg follows might be flawed, but flexible and passionate in its own way. The one she rejects is equally determined, but made from a mould that is more set in its ways.
	Joe McCarthy and Jacqueline Dooley during rehearsals for one of their scenes together where Kevin begins to show his feelings for Peg.