Stories from Dubliners still shine like gems, more than a century on

Counterparts & A Little Cloud Bewley’s Café Theatre, Dublin until July 20

Good theatre is often about breaking new ground, but there is also something to be said for polishing gems. And that is the case here with this delightful pair of stories from James Joyce’s Dubliners; both are beautifully dramatised and served up as a lunchtime treat. The show is adapted, directed and performed by Jim Roche and Liam Hourican. First we get A Little Cloud, performed by a versatile Hourican. He captures the delicate pretensions of a Dublin married man, Thomas Chandler, toiling away in the King’s Inns but harbouring secret writerly ambitions. Chandler experiences a complicated mixture of envy and contempt when meeting a college friend home from England, a man who has become a “brilliant figure on the London Press”. The actor flits from one character to the other, from vulnerability to bombast, with great skill. Chamber music from Feilimidh Nunan (keyboards and violin) and Conor Sheil (clarinet) adds greatly to the atmosphere, with the crying baby a particularly neat trick. Then we get Counterparts, Joyce’s great portrait of a functioning alcoholic. Legal clerk Farrington falls behind on his work in the office and gets chastised by his superior. He pawns his watch to go drinking, foolishly retelling his tawdry anecdote of how he gave cheek to his boss, and gets humiliated in an arm wrestling match. He finally returns to his Sandymount home and takes his bitterness out on his family. As an actor, Roche has a comic instinct and delivers this tale with fine humorous touches, but for all the comedic energy he really conveys the dead-end sadness of this wretched man, too far gone in alcoholic vanity and rage to have any real grasp. The emotional heft here is also enhanced by Sheil and Nunan’s perfectly judged music, with funny typing sound effects, and a haunting ballad sung by Nunan to close. Produced by Volta (named after the Dublin cinema Joyce founded) and Bewley’s Café in association with the James Joyce Centre, these stories are a perfect hour’s entertainment. They suit the venue thoroughly, with Bewley’s coffee getting a name check along the way. Music is integral to the overall mood of Joyce’s work, so the deft musicianship here is especially pleasing. First published 110 years ago, Joyce’s sensitive stories of Dublin life still make charming chamber pieces.