In a hectic and brilliant Dublin Fringe Festival 2017 lineup, efficacy 84 stands its ground. Recently chosen as one of The Irish Times Top 15 shows (https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/stage/dublin-fringe-15-shows-you-need-to-see-at-this-year-s-festival-1.3211302)  to catch at the festival, it tells the story of the Kerry babies atrocity in a challenging and provoking way, tackling issues such as public autonomy, justice, and identity. Directed by recent Drama and Theatre Studies graduate Luke Casserly, the show started off as his Advanced Devising Project in the Samuel Beckett Theatre, and has moved to Smock Alley Black Box for the Fringe. Cast and crew include Maia Purdue, Rua Barron, Alexandra Conlon, Siofra O Meara and Simon Geaney. Last week, Tn2 sat down with Luke Casserly to ask a few questions about this hotly-anticipated directorial debut.

What is efficacy 84 about?

It’s about the Kerry babies atrocity of 1984 – the story of a dead child washing up on Cahirsiveen Beach on 14 April 1984. That death was linked to a young local woman named Joanne Hayes, who then went on to confess to the murdering of a child. Her family gave testimony. What then transpired was really interesting. When An Garda Síochana went to search the family home they discovered another dead child concealed in a pond.  The family confessed to concealment of stillborn child instead, retracting the original confession. What remains is that there is no identity for the child who washed up on the beach. What we have is a lot of sensationalist headlines and information about the case, but at heart of it we don’t really know what happened, and that’s where the theatrical intervention comes in efficacy 84, where we’re trying to perform the remains of a story that essentially cannot be concluded.

For me, the idea that everything in the theatre will ultimately be forgotten is very interesting –  we can’t really archive what happens on stage because a lot of it is very ontological and very frail.There is no way to preserve it, and that I think is a fitting metaphor for a case like this.

How do you think the audience will react to that? Are there echoes of the themes of the story – of women lying or Gardai injustice –  in modern society? Are you more looking back?

Actually what I would say about this piece, and this is the unusual part, is that this didn’t start off as a socially concerned, current affairs piece of theatre. I don’t really understand I’m unsure about people putting very political ideas into the theatre, for the confusion as to what the audience actually get out of that thought or idea. If it’s very strong, the audience don’t really have that much room to debate and challenge. With [efficacy 84] it isn’t about forcing, but about presenting images which have multiple readings and layers.

The piece is fundamentally concerned with the relationship between the audience and the image on stage, but I don’t really know how the audience will react. I think they will generally be quite challenged and excited by what they see and how they see it being presented. It’s a story about a women, about Ireland, injustice, grief – you have to start off from an emotional place. What brought me to the story was my interest in distancing myself from material and presenting it in an unusual way so that the audience can come to terms with the absurdity of what happened.

 

What devices do you use in the show to illustrate such a sensitive topic?

Well, I think the first thing to consider is that we’re not trying to make a documentary about the Kerry babies atrocity. Rather, we are trying to stage the traces … something. I think the intervention comes in the framing of the show – and a very pared back aesthetic onstage. The stage itself is made of chipboard material to connote the idea of a building site. A lot of the lighting instruments are exposed; we see the ugliness of the theatre in the production and that’s intentional.The show has to be stripped back and exposed to draw attention to the looseness and unfinishedness of the material.Both textually and visually, the performance code is about building up something and then breaking it down, again and again. It’s the theatre of images where things unfold and unravel out of control, before being brought back in. I think it will be a real rollercoaster for the audience.

Why did you choose this story?

I suppose, to give background, I’m really interested in Ireland as a subject. There’s a lot to unpack. Ireland is very complicated and layered. I discovered this case about a year ago, at the same time as the Tuam babies case and the septic tank was coming out. I was interested in these unusual things happening in an Ireland that seems so far away from us today, and how we can touch and relate to them, how we can even begin to understand them.

It was that curiosity that brought me to this story, and the lack of information, and how do you even begin to stage nothing, stage a sentence that somehow symbolises an entire relationship between two people? You get a lot of that in the performance. There’s a moment in a bizarre, moving scene where the relationship between Joanne Hayes and Jeremiah Locke is alluded to and the entire relationship is condensed into how one person on stage handles a teacup, the uncertainty of where it’s put, the tremble. A fitting metaphor for what the play is trying to do – stage the impossible, stage the unstageable. It is a really ambitious piece in its motive.

How do you think efficacy 84 fits into this year’s Fringe line up, or indeed breaks away?

I think the fringe has always been an opportunity to dabble in material that is not usually dabbled in, look at things in a new way and I think that is what efficacy 84 is doing. We are looking at the fringes of this story so it fits into the festival very well.

Did you come across any challenges when directing?

Definitely. When I began undertaking this project it was a complete risk, a lot of things could have gone wrong, because at the centre of the story are real people and a real child who we don’t know. It was challenging to come to terms with the ethical challenges, whether we have the right to perform this story. What we discovered was that, actually, we do have the right to tell this story as this story belongs to the public at this point – books have been written, Joanne Hayes is a public figure –  it might not be something that she welcomed, but it has happened, and that’s what we are trying to deal with. We are not putting words in anyone’s mouth. We’re looking at responsibility and taking ownership, to try convey the confusion that was surrounding the case. I think if all we achieve is capturing that in the performance, then we will have succeeded.

Did Trinity inspire your career in any way?

Yeah it did. As I said I’m from Longford, and this is a rural story, and me going to college in Trinity, creating a piece about Kerry, it’s a mix of life experience. It’s a rural story told in an urban and contemporary way. I think my experience in Dublin and Trinity has given me an interesting perspective on how to look at something this rural and isolated, and expose it in an exciting and creative way and that has inevitably been influenced by my four years at college. It’s my first professional outing and it started off in Trinity as my Advanced Devising Project so I’m really thankful for support and guidance I got..

 

Efficacy 84 will run at Smock Alley Black Box 20-23 September, with TN2 reviewing the production later this month.

7pm 20-23 / 1:30 matinee 23.

€11-14.