The Beacon – Without Which One Is Lost
This mystery-meets-dysfunctional-family play is so well crafted not a single twist peers out before its time. Two-hander scenes within the piece drop provocative clues like breadcrumbs, yet with multiple revelations to come, one’s path is never straight or sure. Main characters are complex and consistently intriguing.
Beiv (the remarkable Kate Mulgrew) is a fine artist and widow currently living in a cottage on an island off the coast of West Cork that belonged to husband Michael. While Michael was alive, it served vacations. Even after their divorce, Beiv and her ex would spend summers together there engendering gossip.
Kate Mulgrew (Beiv), Ayana Workman (Bonnie)
The artist’s Dublin home has been sold in favor of single residence. With the help of her son’s old friend Donal (Sean Bell), she’s renovating the seaside house into a structure of glass and modernity, nothing between her and passionate nature. Beiv is hard-edged, sharp-tongued, independent, and driven.
Solitude is shattered by the arrival from America of her adult son, Colm (Zach Appelman), and his new, young bride Bonnie (Ayana Workman). Colm is so hostile to his mother one initially wonders why they’ve come. Bonnie, on the other hand, is thrilled to meet Beiv. Taught the painter in school, she considers her Ireland’s greatest feminist artist. Bonnie sees vast representation in an abstract canvas on the easel.
“It’s an orange,” Beiv retorts.
Sean Bell (Donal) and Zach Appelman (Colm)
When Colm goes to book them a room at the inn (renovation leaves no bedrooms at the cottage; Biev sleeps on the couch), mosquito-like, Bonnie prattles and gushes at her mother-in-law who practically swats her away. “Why do Americans marry so young? You don’t know yourself or the person you’re marrying,” Biev asks rhetorically. In order to otherwise occupy the girl, she rips off a sheet of paper and hands Bonnie charcoal.
Colm’s motives for the visit are, to say the least, conflicted. It’s been years since he’s seen Beiv and he’s announcing his marriage, but the unsolved mystery of Michael’s passing gnaws at him. Like some of the locals and a nosy podcaster (Ray David Mattar Merten) who mines unresolved death, Colm suspects his mom. Confrontations are tumultuous.
Sean Bell (Donal), Kate Mulgrew (Beiv), Ayana Workman (Bonnie), Zach Appelman (Colm)
Beiv, Colm, and Donal all have painfully kept secrets revealed in the course of the play. Michael’s disappearance is explained (as much as it can be) as are character issues contra to the way Colm always thought of his dad. Portentous undercurrents swirl.
Drunk one night, her freshly minted spouse verbally attacks Bonnie who runs into the dark. “I’ve never spoken to her like that before. I treat her like a princess,” Colm wails, heading out to search. “In my experience,” Beiv replies, “Women don’t like being treated like princesses. It’s powerless.” Lives change.
The wind drones. Seagulls call. Visitors leave. Exhausted, Beiv goes back to work.
David Mattar Merten (Ray) and Ayana Workman (Bonnie)
The company is splendid. Mulgrew, whom we see too rarely on stage, is a self-contained tornado. She moves like a force of nature unearthing dust around her. Commitment and concentration are omnipresent. Donal and Bonnie are more complex than first assumed. Both actors create believable characters, Bell with frustrated vulnerability, Workman with pluck and oblivious naiveté. Merten’s Ray is as infuriating as one might imagine under the circumstances.
Director Marc Atkinson Borrull wrangles the stage full of wet cats while maintaining clear personalities, credibility and excellent pacing.
I only wish we knew a bit more about Michael.
Out a glass picture window, mostly roiled sea (projection) reflects emotions of those irrevocably caught up in the story. While the conceit is solid, a horizon line would have made visuals less fantastical and distracting. The house/studio, spare and modern, works well as does a cement mixer waiting on what will be the patio. (Scenic and Lighting Design by Colm McNally)
Sound Design by Liam Bellman-Sharpe is unnerving without being obtrusive.
Photos by Carol Rosegg
Irish Repertory Theatre presents
The Beacon by Nancy Harris
Directed by Marc Atkinson Borrull
Through November 3, 2024
Irish Repertory Theatre
132 West 22nd Street
