He Dies in the End – Dublin Fringe Festival – Review

Performances  – 16 Sept, 18:30 (preview), 17 Sept, 21:00 (preview)
18 – 20 Sept, 21:00, 19 – 20 Sept, 13:15

Venue – Smock Alley Theatre – Boys’ School

He Dies in the End written by Liam McCarthy

The stage consists of a stool on which Matty (Darren Yorke) occassionally sits. It is starkly simple but it is appropriate as it allows Yorke to use unhindered his considerable acting skills.

Matty, as a pedestrian, has been killed in and around Wexford Street, Dublin by a car. He in consequence is dead as the play begins. The first iteration of his story concentrates on the accident itself but gives various snippets of his life and what he had been doing on the fateful day. It is mundane and Matty has no difficulty in proclaiming that his life had not added up to much.

He then reiterates the story several times but each time he expands on a different aspect of the story. So we hear about his father from Longford who has a daily routine, about his mother who could not stand it and has gone to live in the West, his girlfriend Louise with whom he sleeps surreptitiously, his brother Brian who is already dead, his editor Patricia because he has apirations to be a writer and Peter who is his boss in the menial job he does as a dog’s body in order to earn some money. The repetition of the basics of the story allows each of the facets which are being expanded to sparkle. Each gives a different insight into Matty and by the end he is indeed an ordinary human being whose life is of interest and that he had challenges which he faced to the best of his ability.

However McCarthy’s text is observant and sees the humour within the mundanity of Matty’s life. Yorke brings to vibrant life that mundanity. Each retelling of the story reveals a different aspect of the complexity of Matty’s life. But complexity leads to humour and Yorke brings considerable levity to the text while his personification of Patricia and his father in particular are little jewels.

McCarthy has used the unlikely device of an accidental death to allow the deceased to reflect on the last day of his life. It is a challenging stratagem but with the fine acting of Yorke, the quality of the writing and the necessary comic input it works in spades.