Intergenerational Moves and Documentary Theatre

Abstract

In solo performances by Neil Watkins and Veronica Dyas, we saw how shame had an isolating effect, with the power to separate the artists from their families and communities. This chapter extends this discussion of exclusion and reality-based performance, by focusing on work in which a comparatively young generation of theatre and performance makers represent older subjects who cannot represent themselves: Seán Millar and Brokentalkers’ Silver Stars (2008), a song-cycle created from the real-life experiences of gay men who left Ireland since the 1950s;¹ Amy Conroy’s I ♥ Alice ♥ I (2010), a mock-documentary in which an older lesbian couple tell the story of their lives together, produced by Conroy’s company HotForTheatre; and Una McKevitt’s The Big Deal (2011), based on two transgender women’s experiences of sex reassignment surgery, produced by her company Una McKevitt Productions. These works collaboratively construct versions of reality, variously drawing on text, photographs, video recordings, interviews and oral history. Here I trace the discrete experiences which these productions respond to and chart, and the theatrical methods deployed to do so, exploring how they function as works of intergenera-tional dialogue and recovery that strive to recuperate otherwise lost queer histories into cultural consciousness.

‘And of course anyone who is Irish knows that if you don’t speak about it and you ignore it, it will go away.’

Michael Byrne speaking Brendan Fay’s words, Silver Stars

‘We are here, we were here all along.’

Alice Kinsella, I ♥ Alice ♥ I

‘I will never again have to pretend I’m something I’m not. The horror is over.’

Cathy, The Big Deal