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The Long Wharf Theatre, which holds its mainstage season from fall through spring, has tried a lot of different things to use its space in the summertime: workshops, Arts & Ideas festival offerings, touring shows, small-cast comedy staples involving nuns and neurotics…
Last summer was all about a multi-million dollar renovation of the mainstage, auditorium, main lobby and other parts of the theater. But this year Long Wharf is apparently back in the summer programming game. The theater just announced a May 21 through June 2 engagement of Frank & Malachy McCourt’s popular Irish melodrama A Couple of Blaguards. The two-man show is directed by Howard Platt (“Hoppy” from TV’s Sanford & Sons and a seasoned theater director), who co-stars in it with Jarlath Conroy (Bill McDermott in George Romero’s film Day of the Dead, The Gravedigger to Paul Giamatti’s Hamlet currently at Yale Rep).
The play became popular in the wake of Fairfield County resident Frank McCourt’s bestselling memoir Angela’s Ashes, but was actually created long before that book. It’s a collection of first-person stories derived from Frank’s years as a schoolteacher and Malachy’s as a bartender.
It has toured through the state and remains popular in community theater circles. Malachy McCourt, who’s written a few books himself, acted in numerous productions of the show. (Both McCourt brothers are now in their 80s.) The Platt/Conroy rendition is an established touring production which you can read about at http://www.acoupleofblaguards.com/ It’s up to the Long Wharf how complex a set it wants to provide for this talky show. (Shown above is how it looked in a Chicago theater.) Essential set pieces are a table, a podium and a coat rack. Some settings have been pub-oriented.
A Couple of Blaguards plays at Long Wharf’s Stage II space (222 Sargent Drive, New Haven; 203-787-4282, www.longwharf.org) May 21 through June 2. Tickets are $40.
The Long Wharf’s press release for this show suggests that other summer-season announcements are forthcoming.