Brian Friel 1929 - 2015

[Padraig]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-34424041

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Yes - just heard this sad news on R4. One of the great early joys of my teaching career was discussing Translations with "A"-level classes in the mid-'80s. A great talent who shall be deeply missed.

[jean]

A wonderful play - not mentioned in the list of his works I heard on R4 today!

[Conchis]

Not a big fan, I have to be honest - his version of Hedda Gabler is loopy.

However, I like Faith Healer a lot.

[Padraig]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-34439042

Interesting accents? - South Donegal, Belfast, Derry and the reporter's, which I in my inexperience would call 'English'.

[Padraig]

Not a big fan, I have to be honest .

Me either, but I thought others........ well, jean and ferney......

[french frank]

Translations is the one play I have seen - and enjoyed. But it's been nagging me ever since as to where, or in what part of my life, I saw it.

[Stanley Stewart]

Hampstead Theatre, ff? I saw it there in the early 80s. Working in COI documentaries at the time, I phoned him in Belfast requesting a script as the play and Friel's work for Field Theatre (if my memory is accurate) would have been ideal for our 30 mins documentary series, Perspective, and how his theatre company were successfully bridging the areas of political division still raging at that time. He was definitely interested but, alas, - you've got it! - the 'establishment' took fright at such a notion - but I seem to recall that the production transferred to the South Bank NT complex, the Cottisloe? after the Hampstead run. He was a direct and accessible personality. RIP

[french frank]

Hampstead Theatre, ff? I saw it there in the early 80s. Working in COI documentaries at the time, I phoned him in Belfast requesting a script as the play and Friel's work for Field Theatre (if my memory is accurate) would have been ideal for our 30 mins documentary series, Perspective, and how his theatre company were successfully bridging the areas of political division still raging at that time. He was definitely interested but, alas, - you've got it! - the 'establishment' took fright at such a notion - but I seem to recall that the production transferred to the South Bank NT complex, the Cottisloe? after the Hampstead run. He was a direct and accessible personality. RIP

Hampstead does ring a bell. I remember venturing to a smallish theatre there to see something. Could well have been the early 80s. That fits! Thank you.

[jean]

I think I first saw it there, too.

The other play of his I particularly remember is Aristocrats, which I saw in Dublin - though not in 1990 0r 2014, so they must have done it some time in between! Wonderful set I remember.

[subcontrabass]

I think I first saw it there, too.

The other play of his I particularly remember is Aristocrats, which I saw in Dublin - though not in 1990 0r 2014, so they must have done it some time in between! Wonderful set I remember.

From the Abbey Theatre website it also ran from 17 November 2003 to 24 January 2004 ( http://www.abbeytheatre.ie/archives/...on_detail/4823 ). The original production was in 1979 (not 1990), with two runs in that year at the Abbey Theatre and a short run at the Arts Theatre, Belfast.

[jean]

That'll be the one I saw. (I misread 1990 as the date of the first production - that was Dancing at Lughnasa. )

I don't suppose the play would have been terribly interesting to English audiences.

[Padraig]

I don't suppose the play would have been terribly interesting to English audiences.

Would that be the play's fault, jean, or the audiences'?

[jean]

It wouldn't be anyone's fault! But I'm just guessing that most Irish people in England arent't very interested in the decaying Catholic aristocracy. Not that they would be in a play about the decaying Protestant aristocracy either, though Molly Keane's novels have a readership.

For myself, I find it all fascinating.

[Padraig]

It wouldn't be anyone's fault! But I'm just guessing that most Irish people in England arent't very interested in the decaying Catholic aristocracy. Not that they would be in a play about the decaying Protestant aristocracy either, though Molly Keane's novels have a readership.

For myself, I find it all fascinating.

But aren't English audiences supposed to be very interested in anything to do with class, and accents and all that? And aren't Friel's plays supposed to have universal themes? So wouldn't decaying aristocracies be an attractive theme to English audiences?