About
“An impressively brave piece of work.” The Irish Times “All of us running around, thinking we’re so clever, so good at keeping secrets, and actually everyone knows everything and just never says.” “an impressively brave piece of work.” A world premiere production, BÁN is written by Carys D. Coburn and directed by Claire O’Reilly. A reworking of…
“An impressively brave piece of work.” The Irish Times
“All of us running around, thinking we’re so clever, so good at keeping secrets, and actually everyone knows everything and just never says.” “an impressively brave piece of work.”
A world premiere production, BÁN is written by Carys D. Coburn and directed by Claire O’Reilly.
A reworking of Lorca’s The House of Bernarda Alba, BÁN is faithful but not close. Like the sisters at its heart – bound tightly, neither open nor tender, mourning their father, surveilled by their mother. They long for escape, power, the local eligible bachelor. The question isn’t who can have which, it’s can any of them have any?
BÁN isn’t simply mapping Franco’s Spain onto de Valera’s Ireland – Catholic Fascism = Catholic Fascism = duh. It’s speaking to anyone anywhen who denial kept alive, but who then wished it hadn’t. (Not exclusively Irish, but VERY Irish.) It’s raw and raucous; dark but not unduly despairing; loving but not unduly merciful.
BÁN is part of the 2025 Dublin Theatre Festival programme and was recently nominated for the prestigious Susan Smith Blackburn Prize.
