Pavilion Theatre, Dún Laoghaire
In the programme note for Dear FrankieFive Lamps Theatre Company reveals that the starting point for its production was the 2004 Mint documentary about the life of Frankie Byrne, infamous host of The Women's Houron RTÉ Radio One and Ireland's first agony aunt. That the documentary and the production share the same name indicates the underlying problem with Niamh Gleeson's script, which is less a play in the conventional sense of dramatic conflict and resolution than a re-enactment of key moments in Byrne's life.
Gleeson's play is shaped around a dramatised reading of Dear Frankieletters and Byrne's responses. The repetitive structure of the script, however, means that Róisín Lonergan's direction quickly becomes formulaic – a loop of letter, response, and exposition framed by Frank Sinatra numbers – although the letters are cleverly crafted to provide a thematic resonance with the real-life revelations.
The production relies on Dorothy Cotter to play the narrator of all the letters, as well Byrne’s sisters, mother, aunt, niece, friend, etc (in total about 50 different roles), and on Donagh Deeney to embody all the men (familiar public figures such as Jimmy Magee, producer of the radio show, and Frank Hall, Byrne’s lover, as well as male family members and friends.) However, they are not really playing characters but caricatures, expressed by an accent or a grimace.
Nuala Hayes, meanwhile, captures the rich quality of Byrne’s distinctly Dublin voice in her performance in the leading role. Hayes is at her best when reading the letters and responding, and perhaps this is no coincidence: Byrne was resolutely professional on-air, even when her personal life was disintegrating in drink-fuelled drama.
With a palette of brown costumes by Maria Blaney and Colm McNally's lighting spectrum, which offers shades of warm yellow and the occasional amber glow, Dear Frankieoffers a nostalgic evening of recognition to those who remember Byrne's distinctively forthright responses to the nation's lovesick women. And for many that will be enough. As Byrne used to say "the problem we're discussing today may not be yours but they may be someday".
– Touring nationwide until May 29
