Galway International Arts Festival 2026: For Dolores

Catriona Faint and Lara McDonnell in For Dolores. Image, Pat Redmond

*****

Those astronomically or astrologically inclined will tell you there was a recent rare alignment of planets. Those theatrically inclined might tell you For Dolores, by writer Eva O’Connor constitutes the artistic equivalent. A rare alignment of director, writer, performers and design whipping up a cosmic storm. Allowing For Dolores, under the auspices of director Jim Culleton, unleash defibrillator charged performances from Catriona Faint and Lara McDonnell.

Catriona Faint and Lara McDonnell in For Dolores. Image, Pat Redmond 

Like all storms, For Dolores is a glorious, angry, teared up, blood and guts, pumping heart of a mess. In which flawed and fallible humans prove perfect in their imperfections. Glaswegian Mo and Dubliner Réaltín, meeting in Edinburgh University, becoming life long friends with complications. Their often hurriedly sketched relationship explored through a mockery of a couples counselling session. O'Connor, snappily shifting from exposition to story in handbrake fashion, skips past key moments and introduces shocks and reversals from out of left field. Yet For Dolores's structural complexity proves supremely smart. Allowing O’Connor move freely through time and puncture tipping point temptations of tacky sentimentality. A danger when you have a wild alcoholic woman, a good girl with a penchant for bad boys, unexpected pregnancies, lost PHD’s, monied Fins and swaggering, young Scottish boys resulting in life changing deaths and soul searing confessions.

Catriona Faint and Lara McDonnell in For Dolores. Image, Pat Redmond 

If characters are steeped in cultural clichés, none of that matters. The fabulous Faint both a force and a revelation as loudmouth Mo. A working class Glaswegian with a chip on the chip on her politicised shoulders ready to kick the world to pieces. Meanwhile McDonnell proves masterfully beguiling as middle-class Réaltín; needy, eager to please, adrift in the tamed wilds of Edinburgh University, her later self tamed by the wilds of motherhood. Her daughter, Dolores, a maternal device co-joining two women who once met in a lift, bonded over The Cranberries and became inseparable. Until they separated. Reuniting during Réaltín’s engagement party where sexual connection and a flush of whiskey leads to catastrophic results. How can you pick up the pieces when life, love, family and friendship have been rent asunder? How do you forgive your best friend, or yourself for the unimaginable? How do you go on when you don’t want to go on? For Dolores, perhaps. That alien being through which old wounds might yet be forged into forgiven memories as bodies express thoughts and words become sensual acts of intimacy. Illuminating shadowed secrets under the pained light of forgiveness.

Catriona Faint and Lara McDonnell in For Dolores. Image, Pat Redmond 

If Alyson Cummins’s set is simplicity incarnate, it’s far richer than it deceptively appears. Cummins’s counselling room underscored with the bric a brac of living memories buried alive beneath the ground both women walk upon. Suzie Cummins’s superlative lights informing the moods and tones of O'Connor's dynamic, female odd couple. Mo’s edgy, working class vulgarity befriending Réaltín’s co-dependent popularity queen a union as unlikely as it is lively and irresistible. Faint and McDonnell’s chemically charged performances detailed, visceral and sensational, with volumes told in the flick of a gaze or a tremor of lip. Sudden snaps into unbearable vulnerability, or energised argument, offset by Nóra Ní Anluain Fay's choreographed rope pulls whoop whooped on the dance floor. All divinely directed by Jim Culleton, ensuring performances fill in for those moments hurried past. Playing with status and pace, the funeral scene touched by shy genius, Culleton allows his brilliant cast to shine then ensures they dazzle under his unobtrusive guidance. A hand unconsciously resting on a thigh, a quiver of pain, a gaze given or withheld revealing the tip of an emotionally charged iceberg. Impeccable pace and perfect timing informing two unforgettable performances.

Catriona Faint and Lara McDonnell in For Dolores. Image, Pat Redmond 

Landing like a barrage of heartbreaking, life affirming, gut punches, For Dolores knocks you down, knocks you for six, then knocks you into the far reaches of next week. Confirming what The Kerryman at Glassmask Theatre recently reaffirmed: that O’Connor is one of our most significant and exciting female storytellers. For which Fishamble deserve to take a bow. Not just for those endless new voices they consistently bring to our attention. But for those like Deirdre Kinahan, Pat Kinevane, and O’Connor who Fishamble loyally nurture and champion over years. Helping fashion careers in a business where such things are often mythical. Simply put: there would be no Irish Theatre worth the name without Fishamble: The New Play Company. You may not agree with all their choices, but you cannot deny their relentless efforts to feed the multitude from their loaves and fishes. For Dolores a timely reminder of the magic that Fishamble nurture.

Catriona Faint and Lara McDonnell in For Dolores. Image, Pat Redmond 

Seen in preview, For Dolores is an exhilarating experience. In which two wildly imperfect women navigate life’s always imperfect pathways. If For Dolores doesn’t start picking up awards, like yesterday, awards are utterly meaningless. Edinburgh Fringe Festival, and other venues along the way; brace yourself. For Dolores is an impossible, impeccable, irresistible joy. Too messed up to ever be cool, Mo and Réaltín make for one of coolest odd couples to hit the stage in ages. Get ready to meet them.

For Dolores by Eva O’Connor, presented by Fishamble: The New Play Company in association with Lime Tree Theatre | Belltable, Galway International Arts Festival and Traverse Theatre, runs at The Mick Lally Theatre, Druid Lane, as part of Galway International Arts Festival 2026 until July 18.

9-11 July Lime Tree Theatre | Belltable 

14-18 July Mick Lally Theatre, Galway as part of Galway International Arts Festival. World premiere opening night, 16 July.

22-26 July Pavilion Theatre, Dún Laoghaire

6-30 August Traverse Theatre Edinburgh as part of TravFest, presented as part of the Culture Ireland Showcase

For more information visit Galway International Arts Festival or For Dolores - Fishamble: The New Play Company