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At New York's Studio 54 through January 29, Roundabout Theatre Company's "A Touch of the Poet" is not the most performed work of Eugene O'Neill's; it is, however, the only completed play in "A Tale of Possessors Dispossessed," a never-completed 11-play cycle of a dysfunctional Irish-American family's history over 175 years, dealing with corruption and materialism in America. O'Neill ripped up other plays in the cycle, and that was a tragedy for the American theatre. WGT's Patricia Jameson-Sammartano reviews the production, which headlines Dublin-born Gabriel Byrne.
Gabriel Byrne Leads Gifted Cast in O'Neill's 'A Touch of the Poet'
Roundabout Theatre Company production a superbly acted drama for lovers of Irish-American theater
By Patricia Jameson-Sammartano
Special to TheWildGeese.com
Joan Marcus, 2005 Gabriel Byrne as Cornelius Melody in Roundabout Theatre Company's "A Touch of the Poet"
NEW YORK (WGT)— A drone of uilleann pipes sets the stage, and the mood, for the current revival of Eugene O'Neill's "A Touch of the Poet" at Studio 54, in Manhattan. It is an improvised touch by Director Doug Hughes, which beckons theater-goers into this fully realized play's lush 1820s-setting.
Piper David Power opens the Roundabout Theatre production, center stage in rough period garb, playing the haunting Napoleonic air "The Bonny Bunch of Roses." The set for the play is the shabby dining room of Melody's Tavern, near Boston, on July 27, 1828. Center stage is a fireplace with a mantle and a dirty oval mirror; two tables and six or seven chairs dominate downstage. There is a doorway with a transom stage left and a small stairway leading to an unseen room stage right. The barroom is also unseen, behind the fireplace, as is another stairway leading to a bedroom. Lighting is done from the back and from the doorway; changes in the intensity of lighting signal changes in the time of day. In Act II, candles also add to the lighting, signifying the onset of evening.
'A TOUCH OF THE POET' AT A GLANCE
"A Touch of the Poet"
by Eugene O'Neill Directed by: Doug Hughes
Studio 54
254 West 54th St. (at Broadway)
New York, NY
CAST: Cornelius Melody: Gabriel Byrne Nora Melody: Dearbhla Molloy Sara Melody: Emily Bergl Nicholas Gadsby: John Horton Jamie Cregan: Byron Jennings Dan Roche: Ciaran O'Reilly
Gabriel Byrne is superbly cast as Major Cornelius 'Con' Melody, the innkeeper who set the shebeen originally along a stage line; the road has fallen into disuse and with it, profits have plummeted. Con, however, plays the lord of the manor, much like James Tyrone in "Long Day's Journey Into Night"; both men live in the past, haunted by what might have been. Melody relives the battle of Talavera when he fought as a British officer and was decorated for bravery by the Duke of Wellington in 1809 during the Napoleonic Wars, while Tyrone relives his days of glory as an actor. Both men have pretensions of being gentlemen; Melody the innkeeper retains a barkeep and owns a thoroughbred mare that he feeds on credit while his family goes hungry; Tyrone buys land and is continually worried about being cheated. Both men are in conflict with their families, yet they love them; both characters are alcoholics and are indeed modeled on James O'Neill, the father of the playwright.
Byrne is no stranger to O'Neill; he received a Tony nomination in 2000 for his work in "A Moon for the Misbegotten," another of O'Neill's autobiographical works. Nor is he a stranger to period drama; among his film credits is the role of Capt. D'Artagnan in "The Man in the Iron Mask." As Melody, he is especially anguished as the one-time hero who dresses in uniform (red coat, gold braid and epaulets, white breeches and knee-length black boots) for the anniversary of Talavera and primps in front of the cloudy mirror, which offers him only a distorted vision of himself.
Joan Marcus, 2005 Byron Jennings as Jamie Cregan, who has come looking for a job from Con Melody (Gabriel Byrne), an old friend from the British army.
He does not acknowledge, if he even realizes, the incongruity of his success as a decorated womanizing British army officer of Irish origin, and he sneers at his shanty Irish patrons despite being snubbed by the nativist Yankees. He is a naturalized citizen of the United States who left a castle in Ireland, and he intends to let the world know it. The theme of exile is powerful in this play. Melody truly is a lonely soul, one who quotes Lord Byron, and drinks his whiskey for breakfast. "I stood among them, but not of them," he recites into the mirror, retaining his pompous pipe dream of being an officer and a gentleman. Byrne achieves the alienation with distinction, and somehow makes the boorishness of Con Melody human.
The Battle of Talavera
The Battle of Talavara, July 27–28, 1809, was part of the Peninsular War in Spain, one of the wars Napoleon waged as he tried to extend French dominion over and even beyond Europe. The commander of the British army during this battle was General Sir Arthur Wellesley, who is better known to history as the Duke of Wellington. Wellesley was born in Dublin, but later famously declared, "because a man is born in a stable that does not make him a horse," denying that made him Irish.
He had 55,000 troops at Talavara, against 46,000 for the French. The latter were commanded by Marshals Victor and Sebastiani, accompanied by the French king of Spain, Napoleon's older brother, Joseph. The majority of Wellesley's army, about 35,000, were poorly trained Spanish troops. The British portion of his army included three Irish regiments: The 83rd Foot (later to become the Royal Ulster Rifles), the 87th Foot (later the Royal Irish Fusiliers), and the 88th Foot (the famous Connaught Rangers).
Luckily for Wellesley, the French attack fell mainly on his better trained British troops. The fighting was fierce, but the attacking French were repeatedly beaten off. Wellesley held the field. The French lost more than 7,000 and the British more than 5,000. Wellesley could claim victory, but word of a French army in his rear soon compelled him to retreat.
— Joseph E. Gannon
Nora Melody, Con's wife, played with sincerity by Dearbhla Molloy, is an Irish-American earth mother. She is the target of his verbal abuse and the recipient of his love; Nora is a simple peasant woman for whom love is servitude. If Con insults her, well that must be the drink talking because she would gladly walk through all the fires of hell to be with her husband. She has sinned by giving herself to Con before their marriage, but her love is her pride. She reminds us of the strength of Irishwomen, many of whom immigrated to this country to take jobs as domestics or textile workers, to save money for those in the old country. Ms. Molloy brings Nora alive.
Sara Melody, Con's daughter and waitress, a pretty young woman played with verve by Emily Bergl, despises her father's pretensions and doesn't hesitate to let him know it. She is in love with one of the characters we do not see, Simon Harford, who is sick; she has been nursing him back to health. Harford is a local Yankee who has "emancipated" himself from his family and taken himself to a solitary cabin to write, analogous to Henry David Thoreau. Simon falls ill; Sara and Nora nurse him back to health. Simon is really the symbolic O'Neill in this play, sensitive, brooding, acknowledging the free black servant of his family as an equal. Sara wants to marry him, seeing a way to rise above the Melody family malaise of drunkenness, poverty and denial. She's an ambitious young woman, yet her ambitions are tied up with not being a man, so her ambitions live through Simon. Meanwhile she fights with her father over his pretensions, much like Jamie and Edmund Tyrone fight with their father. Unlike Nora, she will not stand for Con's verbal abuse. Yet she loves him even as she excoriates him for his pomposity.
High-quality performances also are given by Kathryn Meisle, delightful as Mrs. Deborah Harcourt, who has come in search of her son, and Byron Jennings as Jamie Cregan, who has come looking for a job from his cousin and old friend from the Army. In one scene, Melody nearly beds Mrs. Harcourt, only thwarted when she smells the liquor on his breath and slaps him away. The scene between Melody and Cregan at the end of the first act is particularly gripping, as is a later scene between Con and Sara.
Solid performances are also turned in by Daniel Stewart Sherman as Mickey Maloy, John Horton as the solicitor Nicholas Gadsby, Ciaran O'Reilly as Dan Roche, and Randall Newsome as Paddy O'Dowd.
Joan Marcus, 2005 Sara Melody, Con's daughter and waitress, played with verve by Emily Bergl, despises her father's pretensions.
Hughes is to be congratulated for a superbly directed performance; he manages to take an anti-heroic protagonist and humanize him, so that the audience can empathize with him, no small feat. Santo Loquasto's simple but shabby set is quite effective; the cloudy mirror is an especially brilliant piece of setting because it emphasizes the smudges of Con Melody's self-deception. The costumes are also wonderful; in addition to Byrne's uniform, the women are in period costumes, with Nora outfitted symbolically as a servant, Sara clad first as a waitress, changing into her Sunday best to go on an errand, and Deborah Harford arrayed elegantly, befitting her station. Christopher Akerlind's lighting design orients us as to time of day.
This is not a time in Irish-American history which is heavily examined, but it is of interesting historical note because it fine tunes history for us, showing us that there were Irishman of different classes in this country before the The Great Hunger (An Gorta Mor) halved Ireland's population. This is a period piece that works well, offering historical insight while engaging our emotions.
Tony nominations will be announced May 16, and the Awards Ceremony takes place June 11. As the play was nominated for a Tony during its initial run in 1958 and for a revival in 1978 but won neither time, we will keep our fingers crossed for the Roundabout this time.
"A Touch of the Poet" is not the most performed work of O'Neill's; it is, however, the only completed play in "A Tale of Possessors Dispossessed," an uncompleted 11-play cycle of a dysfunctional Irish-American family's history over 175 years, dealing with corruption and materialism in America. O'Neill ripped up other plays in the cycle, and that was a tragedy for the American theatre. Poet was the last play completed by O'Neill before his death in 1953.
This play is on a limited run and closes Jan. 29. It is for lovers of O'Neill and Irish-American theatre. Oh, and those uilleann pipes — O'Neill, too, would have applauded. WGT
WGT Contributing Editor Patricia Jameson-Sammartano is a longtime member of the Irish History Roundtable, the W.B. Yeats Society of New York, and the NYC Department of
Education's Irish Heritage and Culture Week Council. She is a former chairman
of the UFT's Irish American Heritage Committee and has taught Irish Studies
at St. John's University; she teaches high school in New York City, reviews
books on a freelance basis, and lives in Staten Island. She has written for
The Irish Voice and The New York Irish.
David Kincaid presents 
