Dancing at Lughnesa, a play by Brian Friel. We saw the Sunday afternoon performance at Wellesley Summer Theater, June 2, 2013. Directed by Nora Hussey and Marta Rainer.
From the description that I read in the Globe, I expected a sad dark play. Five adult sisters living together on a remote farm in Ireland in 1936. Their frail elder brother returns from his missionary work in Africa after many years, his mind wandering and perhaps broken. And the sisters' lives get worse, as the oldest sisters loses her job as a teacher, and two of the younger ones lose their piece-work knitting jobs.
Whoah. But it's darker and more sorrowful than that. The play is narrated by the adult Michael, the son of one of the sisters, many years later as he reminisces about that summer of 1936, when uncle returned from Africa. The very device of reminiscence in a play, of knowing that the people depicted are long dead, of course pulls us into a sad, doomed world. I liked it a lot.
The slight bits of humor delighted us, as did the dancing and the loud brash sisters. They were all wonderful performances by the cast. I felt heartsick at the end, and wished that some of the sadness and sentiment had not hit us so hard, yet I felt that I had seen something truly lived. And I wouldn't change it.
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