The Devious Theatre Company

It’s only a few short weeks since we raised some eyebrows and furrowed some brows on High Street, with an awesome display of ‘Trainspotting’ posters in St Canice’s Credit Union window, and already we’re back again.

This week will see us taking things up a notch promotion-wise in the run up to ‘Smitten’, with press releases issued to all local print media and a brand-new window display to feast your eyes on. If you’re around High Street over the next week then make sure and stop by the Credit Union for a less stomach-turning Devious display. A collage of scenic shots featuring Kilkenny landmarks by Eddie Brennan, logos, maps, artwork and posters by Paddy Dunne and behind-the-scenes-snaps by myself and Ken McGuire.

Don’t worry if you can’t make it down to the Credit Union this week, you can check out shots of the display here on the Devious Theatre Bebo Page along with behind-the-scenes snaps at ‘Smitten’ rehearsals and there’s still plenty more displays and promotional material to come.

Tickets for Smitten are being sold in Rollercoaster Records, Kieran Street from 21st of July and they are 10EURO. The show runs August 20 – 23 and starts 8pm nightly. For more information and updates, check out www.devioustheatre.com

SMITTEN
1. struck, as with a hard blow.
2. grievously or disastrously stricken or afflicted.
3. very much in love.

Following on from the success of Trainspotting, we are proud to announce another first for Kilkenny theatre this coming August. Smitten by John Morton will premiere in The Barn, Church Lane, Kilkenny on Wednesday August 20th and will run until Saturday August 23rd.

John Morton previously wrote Devious Theatre’s first production Heart Shaped Vinyl back in 2006 and this marks his second play to premiere for Devious Theatre. The play is being directed by Colm Sheenan, who has worked extensively with the group in the past.

Smitten depicts a tragicomic series of loosely interlinked vignettes set in Kilkenny City over a succession of rainy summer nights. The play takes its cues from the short stories of Raymond Carver and the films of Woody Allen (the early funny ones that is). The characters at the core of Smitten are trying to get their bearings in life, each stuck in their own limbo. The realities of adult life are dealing a harsh blow to the best laid plans, in a way that leaves them totally smitten… in all the meanings of the word.

Alcoholism. Pregnancy. Testicular Cancer. Apathy. Doomed Relationships.
Sock Puppets. Those elusive mystery girls. How to dance to Bruce Springsteen. And rain. Lots of rain. Smitten functions as a theatrical collage, with intertwining narratives and varying forms of narrative giving life to the comic and often tragic stories that litter the rainy streets of Kilkenny City.

The Barn is a studio space that lies right in the heart of medieval Kilkenny. Located in Church Lane, directly behind St. Canice’s Cathedral, the building was formerly home to the old Loreto Convent. The space was developed by Barnstorm Theatre Company who have used it for performance and rehearsal. Devious Theatre are delighted to be the first theatre group outside of Barnstorm to make use of one of the finest performance venues in Kilkenny City.

Tickets for Smitten are being sold in Rollercoaster Records, Kieran Street from 21st of July and they are 10EURO. The show runs August 20 – 23 and starts 8pm nightly. For more information and updates, check out www.devioustheatre.com

Pictured: Stephen Colfer as ‘Spud’. Photo by Shane Hatton.

Another one from the long list of ‘Trainspotting’ reviews, this one from Aisling Hurley in the Kilkenny Voice.

A brilliant night of Trainspotting
A BRAVE and edgy production of Irvine Welsh’s Trainspotting by Kilkenny’s Devious Theatre Company finished an almost sell-out run at Kilkenny’s Watergate Theatre on Saturday.

Based on the novel that also inspired the 1996 hit film of the same name, the play centred on the lives of a group of young heroin users living in Edinburgh, Scotland, during the 1980s.

The fantastically gritty posters depicting characters in a variety of disturbing situations and the warning that the show contained scenes of a graphic nature suggested that the show would be one that Kilkenny theatre-goers would remember for some time.

It did not disappoint.

Ross Costigan delivered a strong performance as lead character and narrator Mark Renton. His portrayal of the unscrupulous but likeable anti-hero was a deviation from some of the more confrontational roles he has recently played and proved that the Kilkenny actor has an extremely bright future.

Other performances of note were those by Maria Murray in the role of Alison and Stephen Colfer who played Danny ‘Spud’ Murphy. Both young actors impressed the audience with their delivery of almost seamless monologues containing difficult subject matter relating to bodily functions.

The sensitive direction by Niamh Moroney and John Morton allowed the audience to wrestle between sympathy for the characters and complete despair that they would allow themselves end up in such a situation.

Full marks are also due to the cast for deciding to include the humiliating and sometimes difficult scenes where Spud soils the bed sheets in a friend’s house, where Renton searches through an overflowing toilet for opium suppositories and where Tommy (played by Ken McGuire) shoots heroin into his genitals.

With this production, The Devious Theatre Company achieved everything that they set out to – to offer Kilkenny audiences theatre that is fresh, exciting and a little bit deviant.

Other cast members included Niall Sheehy as Begbie, Paul Young as Johnny ‘Mother Superior’ Swan, John Morton as Sick Boy, Suzanne O’Brien as Dianne, Simone Kelly as Lizzie, Mairead Kiernan as June and Michael Murphy as a variety of characters.

The theatre group’s next show ‘Smitten’ will run in Cleere’s Theatre, Parliament Street in August. The play, written by John Morton, is set in Kilkenny and is a tragicomic series of vignettes set over a depressingly rainy summer.

Pictured: Ross Costigan as ‘Mark Renton’. Photo by Shane Hatton.

Another review of ‘Trainspotting’, this time thanks to Liam Murphy of the Munster Express;

The Devious Theatre Company returned in punk and grotesque glory to The Watergate Theatre, Kilkenny with a high-octane production of Trainspotting by Shock Jock, Irvine Welsh.

Following on from last year’s weird musical, Cannibal - the Musical, this young and exciting theatre company went full-tilt into-your-face with the theatrical version of the 1993 hit novel that brought a Tarantino-style fame to Leith-born writer, Welsh. Welsh means to shock and be disgusting and further books like Filth Porno and Glue added to the reputation to compel and repulse in often equal measure.

The Litmus test or acid test of companies who take on this play is the famous toilet scene where Renton retrieves his heroin suppositories from a stinking toilet bowl or the waitress/tampon/tomato soup scene. And Devious Theatre Company caught that visceral mood of revulsion and attraction so well. A young adult audience gasped at the unflinching depiction and at the same time were gagging for it and gagging from it. John Morton and Niamh Moroney’s direction caught the mood so well without in any way over glamorising the despair of the characters lost in a toxic fog of hopes and shite.

Eddie Brennan’s set design was grim and grimy. Gerry Taylor’s lighting was stark and edgy as required. Alan Dawson’s sound design was a punk paradise of hard tunes for hard times. A song There Is A Light That Never Goes Out was new to me but it underlined the sliver of hope in such an unredemptive play.

The ensemble cast were excellent and never flinched from the awfulness of the context and never sank into cheap laughter-seeking. Ross Costigan as Renton dominated the production with a powerful physical performance that was very impressive. Maria Murray as Alison was equally powerful and she chilled me to the bone with biting realism. Ken McGuire was a convincing Tommy and his descent into degradation was powerful. Suzanne O’Brien was a significant Dianne as was Mairead Kiernan in a series of cameos. Michael Murphy played about ten parts and he was spot-on at all times. Simone Kelly looked great as Lizzie and caught the caring and uncaring female very well.

Niall Sheehy was the edgy psychopath, Begbie who would stab his father and shag his ma but he tended to rush the accent. John Morton was a fine Sick Boy. Phil Young excelled as Mother Superior and Stephen Colfer evoked sympathy for the bewildered Spud.

The ending of the play is a little bit of a cop-out but Devious gave it a theatrical value as the cast repeatedly changed The Lord’s Prayer. This was a production that led us into temptation and also delivered us from evil.

Here’s another positive review for TRAINSPOTTING. It was published in Gerry Moran’s column in the July 2nd edition of the Kilkenny People.

THE OLD ORDER IS CHANGING, YIELDING PLACE TO NEW.

Watch out for the Devious Theatre Company. They’re good. They’re very good. They’re the future of theatre in Kilkenny.

Well, Trainspotting has come to a close. The aftershow party has rattled a few bodies right to the bone, we’ve been left reeling from some of the feedback heard so far and we’re gradually pieceing together our thoughts on the past week.

Speaking once more as a committee member, actor and having worked as producer on this production, I still find words escaping me as how to explain the events of the past few days.

Taking a bold step to speak on the behalf of the company, we deviants extend our heartfelt thanks to everyone who came along to Trainspotting and all who enjoyed the production. Without doubt this has been our biggest challenge to date but reactions and feedback have by far exceeded any remote expectaion we may have had before opening the curtain last Tuesday night.

We’ll be posting reviews, comments from the cast and crew, photographs from the course of the week and opening up a few new areas on the website with an archive of Trainspotting material.

We’re taking a week off for ourselves before breaking into pre-production for our next show, due to open late August. It’s all over bar the shouting, but if any of the cast and crew still have voices after the weekend’s celebrations then it will be a minor miracle.

Once again, thanks to each and every one of you who shared in the Trainspotting experience. I genuinely hope you enjoyed it as much as we did in putting everything together.

We’ll be back later in the week with more.

Ken

Here’s our first press review for TRAINSPOTTING. It was published in John Cleere’s ‘Cleere Thinking’ column in the June 26th edition of the Kilkenny Advertiser.

TRAINSPOTTING AT THE WATERGATE THEATRE

JOHN CLEERE

So we’ve arrived. The past few days have seen a flurry of activity as the Devious crew have worked at break neck pace to get everything into gear. We arrived into the Watergate Theatre early on Sunday morning and it’s been all go, go, go since then. I’ve loved every single fucking minute of it, the excitement leading up to opening night is my favourite part of a production and this one has been fantastic. Everybody basically moves into the theatre for the week and it’s like one big messy happy family… of junkies and the like.

Right now, unfinished as it is, the set is looking absolutely wonderful…. Well, wonderful in its manky, derelict style. Eddie, Colm, Tommy, Murt, Liadain and all the other troopers for the cause have really busted their asses getting it into shape and it’s looking great. It still needs a few touch ups today but it should be all ready to go for tonight.

The costumes are looking brilliant, especially under Gerry Taylor’s fantastic lights. God bless red brick wallpaper too… what a time saver! Both myself and Ross now have shite manky dyed hair, thanks to Aileen’s wonderful dye expertise. We now affectionately refer to each other as ‘red heided cunt’ and ‘blue heided cunt’. There will be staring.

The fridge is stacked with Red Bull and to a lesser extent, Red Rooster but at 1.79 a bottle, who’s to discriminate? Fresh drug paraphernalia has been procured…still horrible sharp fuckers. Actors are giddy with excitement…and Red Bull. The music sounds great blasting out around the theatre. We can’t find a cot so we’re using a trolley… for now. After the tech and dress rehearsals we’ve all been so excited, exhausted, energised and depleted to a crazy level. We need, we need, we need! The kettle has consistently been on the boil. The Thomas the Tank Engine theme tune plays incessantly in our heads. Scottish accents have been on the go and boy, are we freaking out people who don’t know us. Ross actually cannot go back to his normal accent. Plus we look odd anyway. We’re all excited, prepared, anxious and ready but most of all, after all the months of blood, sweat and tea… we’ve arrived.

And I hope you enjoy our stay as much as we will.

Irvine Welsh’s Trainspotting starts tonight and runs until Saturday 28th of June. Tickets can be booked in the Watergate Theatre and at their box office on 056 – 7761674. Tickets are 12EURO and the show begins at 8pm nightly.

Theatre: it beats any meat injection, it beats any fucking cock in the world. Wait… hold on… eh… ah, fuck it. It does.

John Morton
Co – Director
Trainspotting

So we’re nearly there, a week off our arrival in the Watergate Theatre. Fucking hell, it’s been a quick two months.

All the posters have been completed. All 10 of the bastards. A serious amount of props and kudos must go out to our own Paddy Dunne for the serious hard work and graft he’s put into the poster designs for Trainspotting. I’d go out on a limb and say, not only are they wonderfully representative of the characters who populate Irvine Welsh’s work and create a perfect sense of the world they inhabit but they’ve done a great job of not stepping on the toes of the film incarnations. A hell of an achievement all round Paddy, and it was a pleasure to work on them with you.

Months ago, myself, Paddy and Niamh really busted our asses as we entered pre-production on establishing the style of this play, its colour scheme and the general design scheme. Months on from that, we’re happy with how it’s worked out. I think it’s going to be quite a unique interpretation and hopefully in line with what Harry Gibson wanted to achieve with Trainspotting on the stage. Part of our approach was trying to move away from the film but another part of it is trying to establish a truly unique theatrical experience and I’m confident we’re going to achieve that.

Rehearsal wise, we’ve finished all our blocking and now the actors are polishing their performances and generally tightening up their scenes. They’re a great bunch, and I can genuinely say, the best bunch of actors I’ve ever worked with on any production. Ever. Full stop. And that includes any other amateur, college or professional shows. And if I may sound not too professional about it, I can’t wait for the few post show drinks with this lot. When you’re dealing with subject matter as dark and intense as that in Trainspotting, it really helps to be with a bunch of people who can keep things light hearted and they really are a funny bunch of fuckers…. Yup, top cunts all round.

Speaking of which, we should really have brought a swear jar into rehearsals. Everybody has grown sailor’s mouths since production started and it’s a bit scary how desensitized we’ve become to really hardcore swearing. Between our foul mouths and our suitably degenerated costumes we should form quite a scary proposition for people post show each night. And of course, our poor families.

In many ways, I think everything is gonna seem a little tasteless after Trainspotting, it’s been a hell of a ride for all of us at Devious. Much better than Kilkenny to Athy, that’s for sure.

Of course, as Mark Renton advocates, the importance of preparation is key and we’ve been frantically scurrying about trying to get everything in shape. Myself, Paddy, Niamh, Kev and Ken have been trying to make sure that boats haven’t been missed on the program or PR front and it seems to be quite smoothly building word of mouth. All boats have been caught but forget boats from now on, trains all the way!

But hopefully that will show how ingrained this show has become into our waking hours! And I think our living, breathing and walking of Irvine Welsh’s work will show up onstage. But there’s a week to go, lots more needs to be done. We haven’t quite arrived yet but we’re due to…

Tickets for Trainspotting are still booking at The Watergate Theatre, the number is (056) 7761674 and the dates are June 24th – 28th. I hope to see you there.

John Morton

Co-Director

Trainspotting

P.S. As a recommendation, for anyone who hasn’t read it, Irvine Welsh’s PORNO, the sequel to TRAINSPOTTING, is a fantastic read. Myself and Paddy have been knuckling into it the past few weeks and I can’t recommend it highly enough. This is my second read of it and it’s still so fresh and well written. I just hope they make it into a movie… fuck Ewan McGregor.

‘Good ol fashioned Scottish hoaspitality. Ye cannae beat it’

The final reveal in our series of Trainspotting posters sees the debut bow of the wide eyed wannabe entrepreneur with a heart of pure deviousness, Simon ‘Sick Boy’ Williamson.

Junkie. Rent boy. Pimp. Sean Connery devotee. Sick Boy tries to be a lot of things. As played by John Morton, we see that underneath the smooth calm exterior is a man who would screw over his friends just as easily as he’d screw a couple of American tourists, sexually and financially of courshe. Always on the game, seemingly with nothing to lose… or does he?

John Morton is a founding member of The Devious Theatre Company and has appeared in all of their productions. He is also Co-Director on Trainspotting.

This poster also features Mairead Kiernan (right), who plays a variety of different roles in Trainspotting. This marks Mairead’s debut role with Devious Theatre.

As designed by Paddy Dunne, these character posters for Trainspotting have served to introduce the many faces of Irvine Welsh’s work, or even reintroducing them to people familiar with the previous incarnations of the characters.

Tickets for Trainspotting are already available in The Watergate Theatre and can be purchased at 056 – 7761674.

Trainspotting will arrive onstage, next week, from June 24th to the 28th.