Griffonage Theatre director Katie Leckey in rehearsal for FourTold, next week’s focus on Irish playwright Lady Augusta Gregory at Theatre@41, Monkgate. Picture: John Stead
CHANCES are high that you will never have heard of Lady Augusta Gregory, but why not?
“Because she fell out of favour in her native Ireland,” says Griffonage Theatre co-founder and director Katie Leckey, introducing the neglected playwright from rural Roxborough, County Galway, whose work will be reactivated in FourTold, the York company’s quadruple bill of one-act comedies at Theatre@41, Monkgate, York from October 6 to 10.
Here are the facts: Isabella Augusta, Lady Gregory was an Anglo-Irish dramatist, folklorist and theatre manager, who co-founded the Irish Literary Theatre and the Abbey Theatre, Dublin, with William Butler Yeats and Edward Martyn.
“She was very popular in the early 20th century, in America too, and she was especially popular in own lifetime [Augusta died on May 22 1932, aged 80]. She was still being performed regularly until the mid-1950s,” says Katie. “But her plays died out mainly because they were mostly performed at Abbey Theatre, which she’d helped to create.
James Lee, left, Helen Clarke, front, Wilf Tomlinson, back, and Katie Leckey rehearsing for Griffonage Theatre’s FourTold. Picture: John Stead
“What these plays were at the time was commercial theatre, light comedies. Irish plays written for Irish people, performed by Irish actors.
“Only one of the plays we’re doing has been toured anywhere near recently, and even that was 25 years ago, when two productions were done in England, but Coats has never been performed in the UK.”
Until now…when Griffonage Theatre, the York company with University of York roots and a flair for the madcap and macabre, will feature Coats in FourTold, an “evening of captivating storytelling, complete with a live band, performed in an intimate setting that makes you feel right at home, wherever that may be”.
FourTold will transport next week’s audiences to the quirky rural town of Baile Aighneas, or “The Town of Dispute,” as Katie calls it. “The town boasts many splendid features, as presented in the four plays: the bustling market – and all its gossip – in Spreading The News!; the restaurant where newspaper editors wine, dine and mix up their Coats; the post office, where the splendid Hyacinth Halvey has sent word he’s coming to town, and the…er, bus stop…where strangers like The Bogie Men can quickly become friends!” she says.
Ben Koch, who will play the roles of James Ryan, Hyacinth Halvey and Taig in FourTold
Lady Augusta is a passion project for Northern Irish actor, director and sound designer Katie, forming part of her now completed MA theatre studies at the University of York. “I did The Bogie Men for a closed, invitation-only exam piece, when it had never been performed in England before,” she says.
“Even in Ireland its performance record is tenuous! Only one performance in 1903. Hyacinth Harvey wasn’t done over here either, so our production marks the first time these four plays will be performed together in Great Britain.
“She didn’t start writing until her 40s and then wrote more than 60 plays, in the decades preceding the Irish Civil War – and novels too, translating Irish myths into English. She was a crazy lady! The best! Because she wrote so prolifically, I’ve taken an eclectic mix from 1903 to 1914, picking plays I liked.
“They’re tiny, tiny pieces, almost like sketches: Spreading The News! is 20-25 minutes; Coats, a rip-roaring 15 minutes; Hyacinth Halvey, 35 minutes, The Bogie Men, 25. Though she did also write Graina, a tragedy, a big epic tale, nothing like these plays, that the Abbey Theatre revived a year ago. She could do the whole scope.”
Peter Hopwood: Cast as Jack Smith In FourTold. Picture: John Stead
Katie has decided not to ‘Anglicise’ the plays “because they were written in the Irish dialect, where she listened to people on her estate in the tiny village of Gort,” she says. “I’ve been there. It’s a lovely part of the world.
“She would listen to the labourers, servants and villagers because she was very philanthropic. The dialect would die out in her lifetime. It was born out of English having to be learned because of colonisation and was spoken by villagers who didn’t speak English well and were uneducated. It’s known as Hiberno English, but more specifically it was specifically KIltartanese because Gort is in and around Kiltartan.
“The fascinating thing is that I’ve found it very similar to the Northern Irish dialect, born out of the English and the Scots coming over, so it’s similar to my own upbringing. It feels familiar to me, and rather than having Irish accents in the show, I want to do an homage to this Irish dialect, like the villagers would have had to learn.”
Katie continues: “It’s beautiful! They say things that you would never say; it’s still in English but the words are in a really fascinating order. It’s been one of the hardest things I’ve had to learn – and I had to learn both roles in Harold Pinter’s The Dumb Waiter last year!”
James Lee in the rehearsal room for Griffonage Theatre’s FourTold. Picture: John Stead
Katie’s cast of eight will be mirroring the performance manner of the Fay Brothers at the Abbey Theatre. “They trained actors in a very specific style that was expressly for Irish actors, mostly based on the voice. They focused on line delivery and rhythm, so there wasn’t much movement in the pieces – and that’s another reason her plays died out outside southern Ireland. They never even broke out into Northern Ireland.
“The other reason she died out? She’s a woman, whereas WB Yeats’s work has always been done. But we all know everyone loves an Irish accent, and just as the Fay Brothers focused on the lyrical and the voice, so I’m doing that too because it should be preserved, but I’m also focusing on the physicality of the language and the individual characters, because the characters are nuts!
“The plays are a snapshot of a very strange rural Irish town: like Royston Vasey, home of The League Of Gentlemen, meeting Father Ted.”
Griffonage Theatre presents FourTold, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, October 6 to 10, 7.30pm plus 2.30pm Saturday matinee. Box office: tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.
Griffonage Theatre’s poster for FourTold, starring Katie Leckey as The Magistrate, Mr Hazel and Darby; Ben Koch as James Ryan, Hyacinth Halvey and Taig; Wilf Tomlinson as Shawn Early and James Quirke; Emily Carhart as Mrs Fallon and Jo Muldoon; Helen Clarke as Bartley Fallon and Mrs Delane; Grace Palma as Mrs Tarpey and Phoebe Farrell; James Lee as Mrs Tully, Mr Mineog and Miss Joyce and Peter Hopwood as Jack Smith
Griffonage Theatre: the back story
YORK theatre company with University of York origins, devoted to the madcap and the macabre, eliciting humour from the darkness. “We aim to make the strange familiar, and the familiar strange,” vows the company motto.
Founded in 2022, Fourtold is Griffonage Theatre’s fourth production, after the devised Poe In Pitch Black, Patrick Hamilton’s Rope, and Harold Pinter’s The Dumb Waiter. “We can be found, lurking in shadows, smiling deviously, at https://www.griffonage.uk/,” says Katie.
The crew for FourTold comprises: director and sound designer, Katie Leckey; assistant director, Miles John; lighting designer and technical stage manager, Leo McCall; set designer, Wilf Tomlinson; stage manager, Zoe Deacy-Clarke; marketing manager, Jamie Williams; executive producer, Jack Mackay.
York company Griffonage Theatre in debut production Poe In Pitch Black