O’Casey in Chicago

The Irish playwright, Sean O’Casey, wanted “to make gold embroidery out of dancin’ words.”

One of his plays, the rich and powerful Juno and the Paycock, is being presented here in Chicago. It’s peopled with memorable characters that are larger than life, and have become icons of the Irish stage.

Plays he wrote that have become classics are Shadow of a Gunman (1923), Juno and the Paycock (1924), The Plough and the Stars (1926), and the following year: The Silver Tassie.

It is easy for us to forget the poverty and hopelessness in Ireland that brought our ancestors here. They came to America to find work and to earn a better future for their families.

O’Casey’s early life is a good example of that poverty. Born in Dublin in 1880, he was one of seven surviving children in the O’Casey family. All his life he suffered from eye problems that began with severe childhood malnourishment.

He grew up and became a laborer. Jobs were so hard to get that he kept it until he was 40 years old and had already published three classic plays!

Neither the Church nor the English government, before the revolution, nor the new Irish government after it, had a vision or plan for a better future for the Irish people. Poverty just had to be endured; things would be better in the next life.

There was no money to educate young Sean O’Casey. So he educated himself by reading omnivorously and by studying great plays, like those written by Henrik Ibsen and William Shakespeare.

In our imagination we can see O’Casey digging in a street or carrying bricks to rebuild a wall in ruined downtown Dublin. At the beginning of the Irish Revolution of 1916, the British navy had shelled Dublin, and created a firestorm that destroyed most of central Dublin.
That revolution continued until 1921, and was followed by a civil war that lasted from 1922 to 1923. During that time much of the country was ruined.

Michael Collins, the leader of the new Irish government, was killed during the civil war. He had a political and economic plan that would have brought prosperity to Ireland. But when he died, his plans were not acted upon until the 1960’s.

In his plays, Sean O’Casey, wants us to “feel” as Dubliners felt during this time of revolution and civil war. He wants us to “feel” the courage of the human spirit, despite the fear, anxiety and helplessness that was all around. O’Casey captured that feeling for future generations, of the people who actually lived in the slums of Dublin.

O’Casey was very much a realistic playwright, but Juno and the Paycock, and his other major plays were definitely expressionistic as well. He was a master of expressionism.

What do these terms means? The American Heritage Dictionary says realism is “the representation in art or literature of objects, actions or social conditions as they actually are.” Photographs of persons living in a tenement, or of children working in a factory would be examples of realism. But expressionism in a play tries to get us to “feel” as the people in those photographs felt. Or as the same dictionary tells us: expressionism aims to be able to feel “the artist’s inner experiences.”

So we can say Sean O’Casey’s Juno and the Paycock is peopled by memorable characters, vibrant dialogue, enormous life-affirming humor, and strong comments on war, poverty and the conditions that caused the squalid tenements.

This play is being produced by the actors of The Artistic Home. They are presenting it through June 29, at the Live Bait Theater, at 3914 N. Clark St. in Chicago, 866-811-4111 or www.theartistichome.org.

The following interview is with Kathy Scambiaterra. She is the artistic director of The Artistic Home, and the actor who plays Juno.

Frank West: “Kathy, why did you choose such an audacious play?”

Kathy Scambiaterra: “They play is powerful and timeless. Sean O’Casey filled it with intense feelings that we can feel today. Juno and the Paycock is filled with life: joy, happiness and tragedy.”

“The Irish people have dealt with so many things: oppression, poverty, hopelessness and war. They play shows how the human spirit survives.”

“As an actor the play demands intense concentration and precision. You’re in the tenement with the Boyles. The text is incredibly rich. It keeps opening and opening, it keeps revealing itself.”

FW: “Kathy, would you speak about the ‘process’ an actor faces when approaching this play?”

KS: “O’Casey demands great emotional involvment. Juno has to face many fears. The actor has to deal with them and with any personal fears. But that being said, the play is delightful.”

“Something else I want to mention is the name Juno. As O’Casey was well aware, that name was the name of a Roman goddess. She was the wife of Jupiter, the foremost god of the Roman pantheon. At times she was a warrior, but also an earth-mother who gave life and comfort. O’Casey used Juno in the play to take an unflinching look at the Irish male.”

FW: “Would you please talk about O’Casey’s ability yo create fully developed characters?”

KS: “O’Casey’s understanding of relationships is astounding. He accurately reveals—I know, I’m married—the intimacy of the mother/daughter relation, and the husband/wife relation.”

“The structure of life in Dublin then could be killing—but the human spirit keeps coming through. We ‘feel’ the beauty of survival.”

FW: “In the play, O’Casey lists the major plays of the Norwegian playwright, Henrik Ibsen. Ibsen had years of experience managing theaters before he began to write plays. How did he influence O’Casey?”

KS: “Ibsen, like Shakespeare, made the theater experience meaningful to all of humanity. He took the private kernel of our lives, and made us feel that each of us was understood. A little town in northern Norway, and the Dublin slums, become a universal human experience.”

FW: “What was O’Casey’s attitude toward women?”

KS: “He was quite empathetic to the plight of women. Birth control was prohibited, so women had no control over their own bodies. Like James Joyce, he described women who had no future, except to keep bearing children. There was no equality of the sexes, and job opportunities.

“Juno’s pregnant daughter says about the position of women: “It’s only as I expected—your humanity is just as narrow as the humanity of the others.”

FW: Thanks Kathy for this interview. I’m looking forward to seeing the play.”
. . . . .
O’Casey uses Captain Broyle to make realistic and blunt comments about the Church’s role in Irish history and Irish society.

Captain Broyle: “I’m goin’ to tell you somethin’, Joxer, that I wouldn’t tell to anybody else—the clergy always had too much power over the people in this unfortunate country… Didn’t they prevent the people in ‘47 from seizin’ the corn (grain), an’ they starvin’; didn’t they down Parnell; didn’t they say that hell wasn’t hot enough or eternity long enough to punish the Fenians? We don’t forget them things, Joxer. If they’ve taken everything else from us, Joxer, they’ve left us our memory.”