Dublin 6

July 11, 2009

I knew Stuart had business out of town last night, but I cruised down to MacNeil’s anyway, maybe to have the opportunity to talk about him. Met Darren, who is funnier and friendlier than just about anyone on earth, a great smiling lad, him in his white shirt and vest looking like the top of the world, too, big handsome boy. We got along great. He made me write down my name and address, and the word “postulate,” which I had used in a sentence. Darren assured me that broccoli is a well-known source of testosterone, and drains estrogen from the system. So, before a fight, load up on it. Reluctantly I went on to use my ticket for The Last Days of Judas Iscariot at the a Project Arts Center. The Last Days of Judas Iscariot was a case study in just how gawdawful theater can be and still make its way boldly to the stage. From inquiries of my own, I understand that Project Arts is a rental facility, and if Making Strange Players wanted to rent it, they could, and the institution would not be responsible for what went on the stage. I do recall, though, with some rancor, and greater rancor when I make comparison between the two plays, that Mr Willie White, who runs the Project, felt that 7 Reece Mews was “unlikely to find Dublin audience.” Anyway, committed acting kept the evening from being outright ludicrous. Nor was the play in any way illiterate. It’s just that obvious writing talent was put in the service of the crudest didacticism, that long soliloquies stating the author’s convictions took the place of dialogue, and that though one can almost stand didacticism when the lessons are right, this play was wrong from conception up, and, when not wrong, sophomoric. It was also rather boldly Catholic. One sees why religion makes it so infrequently to the legitimate stage, for it is difficult to talk about without either sentimentality or dogmatism. This was both sentimental and dogmatic. The passionate exchange between Christ (a very beautiful Chilean) and Judas was so excruciating it made me regret I had taken a front seat; I wanted to get away as far as possible. I did have the opportunity to leave at the interval, and was balanced at the top of the stairs, but in the end I hoped that maybe something would happen to make it all gel, so I turned and trudged back to my fate. The character of Satan was particularly–nay, solely-- well rendered. The author should contemplate this.

Clearing my lungs after the Judas fiasco, I wandered Temple Bar to Frankie’s, where I met Craig, whose accent told me at once he was a Brit. From Ipswich, it turns out, here following his girlfriend, an Irish nurse. I asked Craig what his best cocktail was, and he made me a strawberry daiquiri, which I would never have thought to ask for in an Irish bar. Frankie’s basement bar is very stylish. It looks, in fact, like the set of Present Laughter.

It was a very happy night, considering the people I met and the joy of the meetings, and I came back to the hotel smiling.

Afternoon: The day was spent wandering aimlessly about, and that was exactly what I wanted to do. Sat at a café in Temple Bar making Dublin haiku. A new play came gushing into my head at exactly the spot where The Beautiful Johanna was born, a little outdoor sitting place across from a bakery on Essex Street, near the church where Brett showed his robot a few years back. It cannot be a coincidence. The new one features that horrible faux-leprechaun one sees plucking a tuneless ukelele on Grafton Street. I sat at a table later on the Liffey boardwalk, looking upstream, sipping coffee in the cool gray light and writing at my new play, wondering how there could be a more perfect moment. I broke the moment to take the Liffey boat ride. We were shown a number of bridges, and the new construction down at dockside, and Colin Farrell’s penthouse apartment, and a number of places where U2 had some adventure or other. At the mouth of the Dodder, terns attacked the boat for coming too close to their young. I’ve never taken a tour in Dublin which did not mention how much you’d pay for a night in the Clarence penthouse.