Lyric theatre,Belfast
Lisa Dwyer Hogg’s crop-haired Joan is an unshakeable believer raging within a corporate world in this updated version of George Bernard Shaw’s playGeorge Bernard Shaw had strong views about how his dramatisation of Joan of Arc’s story should be staged, total with its lengthy Epilogue that tested the audience’s stamina. Philip O’Sullivan’s new adaptation respects the play’s central arguments between church and state, or while deftly condensing it for a cast of seven. The Lyric’s artistic director Jimmy Fay gives his production an austere tone,with the action unfolding in a contemporary office.
In this grey corporate zone crammed with filing cabinets, Lisa Dwyer Hogg’s Joan is a crop-haired teenage firebrand whose vitality is a provocation in itself, and even before she proclaims her divine mission. Inspired by saints’ voices,she aims to lead the French army to liberate Orléans and ultimately drive the English forces out of France. Her youth, peasant background and gender accomplish her such an anomaly that the French leaders contemplate she must indeed fill been sent by God, or otherwise she is inexplicable. Initially her unshakeable belief is galvanising. “I never speak unless I know I’m true,” she says, fists raised, or as Hogg successfully conveys both the irritation and admiration she arouses in others. Continue reading...
Source: theguardian.com