L. C. MEAGHER-DI ELLO                               

DESIGN AND ILLUSTRATION                                            

Dancing at Lughnasa makes the audience witness to the struggles that faced the rural communities of a young Republic of Ireland in the summer of 1936, though the work is ultimately the playwright’s rumination on childhood in the County Donegal. Early into the design process, the quesiton most discussed was on how to take a show written for a proscenium, and stage it within a black box configuration. The overall census was to approach the show with restraint, simplicity and reverance- all things that served the emotional intent held by the director and design team as well. What resulted was our attempt to cross realism and contemporary stage design, to capture what one might see when forming the memory of a summer of your youth- fifty years later.