Abstract
The first part of the Monto Cycle, World’s End Lane, took spectators on an individual journey through the history of the Monto as the sex capital of the British Empire in the early twentieth century. Encountering historical characters that lived in the area, spectators were copresent in a living past, told though extant texts and reimagined for contemporary audiences. Blurring the past with the present, the performance engaged with spectators as tourists, punters and voyeurs. In the chapter, inspired by Josephine Machon’s concept of (syn)aesthetics, and Marc Augé’s notion of the ‘non-place’, I analyse my individual multi-sensory experience, from the invasion of personal space, direct address by actors, to moments of interaction and ultimate complicity with the past and the histories of place.
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Notes
- 1.
A Fancy Man was a pimp or bully boy who lured young women into the sex industry run by Madams in three classes of brothels in The Monto, and maintained order among the girls and clients through intimidation and physical force.
- 2.
Maurice Curtis, To Hell or Monto: The Story of Dublin’s Most Notorious Districts. Dublin: The History Press Ireland, 2015. eBook, no page numbers. (Curtis 2015)
- 3.
Thomas Dudley in the 1950s and 1960s became a celebrated and eccentric street character called Bang Bang because of his obsession with Westerns; he would travel around Dublin with a large key pretending to shoot people on the streets and buses. Many Dubliners played along.
- 4.
Jesse Weaver, ‘Geography and Community: ANU Productions’ Four-Part Monto Cycle’, Irish Theatre Magazine, 21 September 2011. http://www.irishtheatremagazine.ie/Features/Current/Geography-and-community—Anu-Production-s-four-pa: (Accessed 28.12.15.) (Weaver 2011)
- 5.
When I saw Laundry the following year I recognized the young man who had tried to enter The LAB was an actor and came to realize then that his attempted entry was part of the performance.
- 6.
Louise Lowe quoted in Jesse Weaver, Irish Theatre Magazine, 21 September 2011, op. cit.
- 7.
Anna Birch & Joanne Tompkins, eds., Performing Site-Specific Theatre: Politics, Place, Practice. Basingstoke & New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012, p. 11. (Birch and Tompkins 2012)
- 8.
Phil Shanahan fought in the 1916, and his pub a meeting place for the Irish Volunteers. He later became a Sinn Féin politician.
- 9.
Erin Hurley, Theatre & Feeling. Basingstoke & New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010, p. 17. (Hurley 2010)
- 10.
Five star review by Peter Crawley (review from 2010 reprinted 2011 for revival. The Irish Times. 30 September 2011. http://www.irishtimes.com/blogs/festival-hub/2011/09/30/worlds-end-lane/ (Accessed 20.12.15.) (Crawley 2011)
- 11.
See Josephine Machon, Immersive Theatres: Intimacy and Immediacy in Contemporary Performance. Basingstoke & New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013. (Machon 2013)
- 12.
Gareth White, ‘On Immersive Theatre’. Theatre Research International, Vol. 37, Issue 3 (October 2012), pp. 221–235. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0307883312000880 (Accessed 30.12.15.). (White October 2012)
- 13.
Caomhan Keane, Review of World’s End Lane, Diatribes of a Dilettante. https://cake1983.wordpress.com/2010/09/16/neuropolis-worlds-end-lane-we-are-all-in-the-gutter-review/ (Accessed 20.12.15.)
- 14.
Machon, Josephine, (Syn)aesthetics: Redefining Visceral Performance. Basingstoke & New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009, p. 14. (Machon 2009)
- 15.
Darragh Doyle, Review of World’s End Lane on yay.ie: http://yay.ie/2011/theatre-festival-review-worlds-end-lane (Accessed 20.12.15.)
- 16.
Marc Augé, Non-Places: An Introduction to Supermodernity. 2nd edition. London & New York: Verso, 1997, p. 90. (Augé 1997)
- 17.
Augé, p. 63.
- 18.
Michel de Certeau, The Practice of Everyday Life. Translated by Steven Rendall. Berkeley, Los Angeles & London: University of California Press, 1998, p. 93. (de Certeau 1998)
- 19.
Brian Singleton, ‘ANU Productions and Site-specific Performance: The Politics of Space and Place’, Breac: A Digital Journal of Irish Studies, 10 July 2014. http://breac.nd.edu/articles/48940-politicizing-performance-anu-productions-and-site-specific-theater/ (Accessed 30.1.15.) (Singleton 2014)
Bibliography
Augé, Marc. Non-Places: An Introduction to Supermodernity. 2nd edition. London & New York: Verso, 1997.
Birch, Anna & Joanne Tompkins, eds. Performing Site-Specific Theatre: Politics, Place, Practice. Basingstoke & New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012.
Crawley, Peter. ‘Review of World’s End Lane’. The Irish Times, 30 September 2011. http://www.irishtimes.com/blogs/festival-hub/2011/09/30/worlds-end-lane/
Curtis, Maurice. To Hell or Monto: The Story of Dublin’s Most Notorious Districts. Dublin: The History Press Ireland, 2015.
Hurley, Erin. Theatre & Feeling. Basingstoke & New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010.
Machon, Josephine. (Syn)aesthetics: Redefining Visceral Performance. Basingstoke & New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009.
Machon, Josephine. Immersive Theatres: Intimacy and Immediacy in Contemporary Performance. Basingstoke & New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013.
Singleton, Brian. ‘ANU Productions and Site-Specific Performance: The Politics of Space and Place’. Breac: A Digital Journal of Irish Studies, 10 July 2014. http://breac.nd.edu/articles/48940-politicizing-performance-anu-productions-and-site-specific-theater/
Weaver, Jesse. ‘Geography and Community: ANU Productions Four-Part Monto Cycle’. Irish Theatre Magazine, 21 September 2011. http://www.irishtheatremagazine.ie/Features/Current/Geography-and-community-Anu-Production-s-four-pa
White, Gareth. ‘On Immersive Theatre’. Theatre Research International, 37 (3) (October 2012): 221–235.
de Certeau, Michel. The Practice of Everyday Life. Translated by Steven Rendall. Berkeley, Los Angeles & London: University of California Press, 1998.
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Singleton, B. (2016). World’s End Lane. In: ANU Productions. Palgrave Pivot, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95133-8_2
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