Port Authority

Synopsis

A boy leaves home for the first time. A man starts a job for which he is not qualified. A pensioner has just been sent a mysterious package. In Conor McPherson's play we meet Kevin Dermot and Joe, three generations of Dublin men, and explore the possibilities life has offered each of them. Port Authority weaves together a wry, moving and funny tale of how modern man faces up to the responsibility of love.

Our Review:

Theo Bosanquet - 30 January 2012

Conor McPherson writes in a programme note that when he first conceived his 2001 play Port Authority, it “didn’t seem to bother with a plot, or try to make a point… It just came along like a song you might catch or perhaps ignore. But I couldn’t ignore it.”

This description applies equally to the finished article; lyrical, haunting, but lacking in narrative structure.

Three Dublin men - one young, one old and one somewhere in between - sit in solitude and tell tales of regret, missed opportunity, and mistaken identity.

The youngest, Kevin (Andrew Nolan), has moved into a house-share where one of his new roomies also happens to be the love of his life. Meanwhile middle-aged deadbeat Dermot (Ardal O'Hanlon) finds himself swept up into a jet set world after being invited to the home of a wealthy financier. And Joe (John Rogan) is prompted to recall an unfulfilled romance by the delivery to his old people’s home o...

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Latest User Review

Amelia Forsbrook - 9 February 2012:

There was something about this production I couldn't quite put my finger on and - by jove! - I think this is it: "Sporting shaggy hair and beard, [O'Hanlon] captures Dermot’s wide-eyed naivety (a quality he can portray better than most) but not the full depth of his loneliness and despair." Thanks for the much-needed, insightful interpretation....

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