A Donegal actress is among the cast of the fresh, imaginative, new musical Alice in Funderland which is currently receiving standing ovations from audiences at the Abbey Theatre.
Ruth McGill from Ardara plays the role of ‘The Duchess’ in this major new production.
No stranger to the Abbey stage Ruth has performed there a number of times including Christ Deliver Us!, The Last Days of a Reluctant Tyrant and The Cherry Orchard.
A graduate from the Professional Acting Programme at the Samuel Beckett Centre, Trinity College Dublin Ruth has gone on to a very successful acting career.
Her extensive list of theatrical credits include Freefall and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (The Corn Exchange), Macbecks (Olympia Theatre), Sweeney Todd (Gate Theatre) and The Shaughraun (Albery Theatre, London). A trained soprano Ruth has co-devised and performed three cabaret shows with her company and has also worked in film and television including Love/Hate, The Clinic (RTÉ) and Leap Year (Spyglass Entertainment). Ruth will be performing, until 12th May, in what has been heralded as the most anticipated theatrical production of 2012, Alice in Funderland..
Fiach Mac Conghail, Director of the Abbey Theatre said, ‘The world premiere of Alice in Funderland marks the first musical to be produced on the Abbey stage in over 20 years.
“This is a major production with a 15 member cast, eight of whom are making their debut on the national stage. Alice in Funderland is a soulful response to a changing society from a new generation of engaged theatre artists. This musical is connected, immediate, clever and beautiful. I am delighted to present this fresh and imaginative new Irish musical on the stage of the national theatre.’
Alice in Funderland, directed by Wayne Jordan, is a THISISPOPBABY commission and was originally created by Phillip McMahon and Jennifer Jennings and developed with Raymond Scannell, Wayne Jordan and the company.
Phillip McMahon of THISISPOPBABY said, ‘Alice in Funderland is a rollercoaster parable for our times.
It reflects what’s been happening in Dublin over the past 15 years, both on the dance floor and on the street. We wanted to create our own style of contemporary musical, inspired by our lives, by the city we live in and by the chaotic world around us, with the best Irish artists from a rising generation to present an exhilarating audience experience.’
Alice in Funderland is a combination of biting social and sexual satire, contemporary musical numbers, rich language, high design and a philosophy of hope and courage. Bringing together some of the most exciting rising Irish talent of this generation, the Abbey Theatre presents a modern day fairy tale for a tender and bruised nation. Resolutely set in an alternative here and now with its inherent darkness and uncertainty, Alice in Funderland was born out of a desire to shake up the landscape of musical theatre in Ireland.
Inspired by both Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and the cadence and rhythm of Irish city life, Alice in Funderland tackles the tumultuous themes of love, change, identity and humanity, through the prisms of electro and pop, in order to examine the true values and aspirations at the heart of our society.
Unlucky in love, Corkonian Alice is all set for her sister’s wedding when a chance encounter with delivery boy Warren sends her spiralling through the Dublin night.
In an epic pursuit for meaning on the strangest night of her life, Alice tumbles through the broken city, bombarded by grinning politicians, pyjama-clad bowsies, egg heads on the edge, twisted scissor sisters, and Delores – The Queen of Hartstown.
The cast includes, Robert Bannon, Lisa Byrne, Philip Connaughton, Susannah de Wrixon, Tony Flynn, Sarah Greene, Keith Hanna, Emmet Kirwan, Ian Lloyd Anderson, Aoibhinn McGinnity, Ruth McGill, Aileen Mythen, Kathy Rose O’Brien, Mark O’Regan and Paul Reid.
Tags: