A pint of Guinness at the world famous St. James’s Gate Brewery, evening strolls through the misty streets and lush countryside, and meeting locals to learn the Irish brogue firsthand are all in a day’s work for actor John Innes as he prepares for his role in Rosebud Theatre’s spring production.
Innes, a 45-year veteran of the stage and screen, and a graduate of the National Theatre School, will play Tony Reilly in John Patrick Shanley’s Outside Mullingar, a romantic comedy set in the farming community of Killucan (kill-OO-can), just outside Mullingar in County Westmeath, Ireland.
On a recent research holiday to Ireland, Innes stayed at the Greville Arms Hotel in Mullingar (notable for its mentions in James Joyce’s Ulysses) and absorbed local customs and history with a respected local historian. “We spent an entire day doing a walking tour,” Innes said. “During that time, I recorded her so the women in the play could hear her authentic Mullingar accent.”
The play, Outside Mullingar, is in turns laugh-out-loud funny and riveting family drama, and tells the story of a nearly confirmed bachelor and his torch-bearing love interest. Innes plays the father, Tony, who’s at the twilight of his life and is torn between passing the farm down to his hardworking but eccentric son (who will likely never marry) and selling to an American nephew who will continue the family bloodline. Playwright Shanley, the award-winning author of Moonstruck (starring Cher) and Doubt, wrote the play as an homage to his own childhood.
“Killucan is about the size of, but a little busier than, Rosebud,” said Innes. “I actually walked out to the family homestead of John Patrick Shanley, from which the story of the play derives. These experiences gave me a more visceral understanding of the community and the characters we are portraying. As I go to rehearsal every day, I carry with me images and memories that are an experienced reality.”
Joining Innes onstage in Rosebud Theatre’s production is Guest Artist Judith Buchan as the recently-widowed Aoife (EE-fah) Muldoon (Marilla in Rosebud Theatre’s Anne of Green Gables), and Resident Company members Paul F. Muir (The Miracle Worker, Our Town) playing the duty-bound dreamer Anthony Reilly, and Heather Pattengale (Our Town, My Name is Asher Lev) as Rosemary Muldoon, Anthony’s tenacious torch-bearing neighbour.
