The play’s title, which comes from Coleridge’s poem “This Lime Tree Bower My Prison,” is a metaphor for contemporary Ireland, though the unsparing diagnosis of the sickness of the time is easily applicable to modern society in general.
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This Lime Tree Bower- (Back Stage West)
By Paul Birchall
Playwright Conor McPherson’s Irish drama meditates on the dramatic theme of “getting
away with it” and asks whether our concepts of ethical behavior are even relevant. The
play also offers a portrait of the Irish personality that is decidedly grim, the three very
different souls here united only in their impulsiveness, lack of emotional awareness, and
the jarring ease with which they betray.
Director Rand Marsh ‘s organic production of a series of monologues voiced by a trio of
very diverse figures, whose stories gradually s cohere at an unexpected point. Youthful
student Joe (Robert Andrus) develops a crush on a school pal who betrays him
unexpected and profoundly. Meanwhile, his rascally older brother Frank (Jeremy
Stevens) gets it into his head to rob the local book is, who’s leaning on his father to pay
up an overdue bet. The two brothers’ anecdotes and intertwined with yet another story,
that of charming but arrogant and hedonistic philosophy grad student Ray (Seth Macari),
who plots to undermine a famous visiting philosopher so as to make a name for himself.
Like McPherson’s better-known play The Weir, the drama’s action is never depicted
visually but is instead described within the stories characters’ recount. And, as in his
other plays, the show’s real star is the lushly blarney-ful, lyrical Irish writing, here used
to develop themes of moral corruption and decay set within the context of daily
decisions. The admittedly minor story flows over us in a dreamlike, slightly eerie manner,
and by the end of the evening, we have learned almost everything there is to know about
these people and why they do the things they do.
Marsh’s staging is intimate and unobtrusive, the language allowed to speak for itself. And
while moments are undermined by the actors’ occasional awkwardness at getting their
mouth around the Irish brogue, the performances are vivid and believable. Macari’s
stunningly heartless Ray, who comes to the realization that he’s more of a brute that an
academic, is especially powerful, but so are Stevens’ hot-tempered, instinctively reactive
Frank and Andreus’ boyishly endearing Joe.
THIS LIME THREE BOWER…(LA WEEKLY PICK OF THE WEEK)
Like Irish playwright Conor McPherson’s the play The Weir and St. Nicholas, this is a
modern version of Celtic storytelling. But it has the distinction of being perhaps the
lightest and funniest of his plays. McPherson is fond of monologues, but here under
Rand Marsh’s direction, the disparate speeches are handled so gracefully that the implied
character interaction is made emotionally palpable. The story starts with Joe (Robert Andrus)
who’s strongly drawn to a delinquent friend Joe’s brother Frank (Jeremy Stevens) helps their
father run a local restaurant, and is resentful of a local bookie making his father’s life miserable.
Local college teacher Ray (Seth Macari) is dating their sister, among many other impressionable
students. When Frank decides to take action against the bookie, all three get involved in a crime
that changes their lives in unexpected ways. Stevens centers the play with a strong dramatic
performance, making Frank’s action entirely sympathetic Andrus is perfectly cast as the sensitive
Joe, with an Irish accent so accurate it occasionally lapses into impenetrability. Macari, however,
​has the most entertaining role as the cheerfully debauched Ray, and he brings an admirable comic
energy to the part.  

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