GATMAN! – Dublin Fringe Festival – Review

Performances – 7 – 10 September @ the Project Arts Centre
Tadhg Hickey & Sophie Motley

If you’re from or spent time in Cork, you’ll know that Gat is Cork slang for booze! This tale is about one man’s abusive relationship with alcohol.

Tom’s journey begins on his Junior Cert results night, where he heads out with a few friends to celebrate. He was a chubby kid and struggled to make friends but all that was about to change. The story moves quickly to the present day, where Tom has hit rock bottom! He’s a down-and-out with a drink problem.

The other element of the tale is the fictional character of Gatman, the champion of Corkopia. We hear about Gatman and his fateful companion Robert, a talking Jack Russell dog.  Tadgh stands behind a transparent screen, with comic-book-style images projected onto it to create this superhero-inspired world.

Tadhg Hickey made a name for himself with his viral comedy sketches during Covid. He does have a history in theatre, with a one-man show In One Eye, Out the Other which ran in Smock Alley in early 2020. This new work is produced by the Everyman Theatre, in Cork, and premiered in March of this year.

This production tackles Ireland’s complicated relationship with alcohol. Some of the best moments of this piece delve into this subject. We treat alcohol abuse with a comic touch, making light of a difficult situation. Tadhg is bright and animated, and his comic moments are nicely interspersed throughout the piece.  The story does have some moments of repetition and several scenes could have been cut without losing anything from the overall flow.

This is a chance to see a new comic writer exploring our love affair with our socially acceptable drug of choice. This is a relatively big-budget, stylish affair, and the interaction with the comic book visuals is very impressive. These various elements are all carefully managed by director Sophie Motley.