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Devised by Breandán de Gallaí of Riverdance fame, Linger is an emotionally-charged exploration of gay masculinity, identity and ageing. In a story communicated through a combination of traditional Irish and contemporary dance, de Gallaί, alongside dance partner Nick O’Connell, reminds us that our bodies are highly-political and constantly writing themselves – the inevitable product of their own socio-cultural circumstances.

Through a marrying of omnifarious mediums from film and music to life drawing and movement, Linger tells the story of a cycle of repression and liberation in the context of the Irish queer male body. The piece quietly, but passionately, builds to reveal a narrative that expounds the complexity of a gay male identity.

Linger starts with de Gallaí and O’Connell seated on opposite sides of the stage and accompanied by an original musical score created by Zoë Conway. Both performers begin with gestural movement and steadily move to weave elements of jazz, step and Irish dance into a performance that combines tradition and modernity – both of which can confine or liberate the body, depending on the context.

The beauty of the piece lies in the differences between de Gallaí and O’Connell’s approaches. They move seamlessly together, almost in perfect unison, but there are slight contrasts in their technique that play into Linger’s attempts to address the ageing process. O’Connell, the younger of the two, dances in an ostensibly more dexterous or flighty manner than de Gallaí, whose movements tend to be relatively more considered. The subtle, but effective contrariety is proffered as a comment on the ageing process and one gets the sense that these two performers are the one person at different stages of life. This is most effectively communicated through an evocative tango and a subsequent exchange wherein both performers swap shirts repeatedly. As each literally wears the clothing of the other, their dual identities are assimilated into one.

What Linger offers its audience is the chance to ruminate on why these men move and dance in this way rather than trying to understand the intricacies of how they do so. Their technique is expectedly one of perfect execution and their footwork is an exhaustive testament to a well-honed craft, but as de Gallaí has considered the body as subject, as well as object, this piece becomes a commentary on the construction of the body politic itself. In Linger, it is made clear that society constructs identity and within that, it embodies what I consider to be one of theatre’s most important functions – to use performance to not only reveal, but also to challenge performativity.

Linger has just finished a run in Project Arts Centre and is showing in Firkin Crane in Cork on 29 January and Dance Limerick on 4 February.