The Delirium Project

Ian Toner, Megan McDonnell, David Rawle, Ronan Leahy and Una Kavanagh in The Delirium Archive. Image, Ros Kavanagh

**

No one is infallible. Not even the excellent Rough Magic Theatre Company. Whose latest offering by award winning playwright Shane Mac an Bhaird, proves even the best can go awry. The Delirium Project a dystopian tale revolving around environmental breakdown, prolonged lockdown and tech companies harvesting memories making for extremely hard going. So hard my disgruntled theatre wife of over a decade drew up divorce papers immediately afterwards.

Like an episode of Malcolm in the Middle, if set in an acid hazed, house coated, dystopian not too distant future, The Delirium Project follows the nuclear O'Connor family trapped in a toxic, yellow fogged Co. Mayo. Dad Tomás, a sort of frenetic Doc from Back to the Future, is intent on capturing their memories on a weird helmet from a large tech company. But memories, and who owns them, are fickle things. Mum Caitríona, lurching about like a disoriented Frankenstein, remembers a horny encounter in Spain rather than the birth of her daughter, Octavia. The voice of stunted reason, who embellishes and fantasises, Octavia is looking to move in with her online boyfriend. Her infuriatingly needy brother, Vassilinki, self-obsessed in the extreme, none too happy about anything. The arrival of The Collector to collect their ‘digital life raft’ heightens tensions between flawed family and flawed memories. Yet if characters are familiar, their bored and boring memories fail to ignite and take up too much time. Like tedious tales shared by a self-absorbed neighbour, memories range from dull, to trite, to asinine, to shoot me now because I’d rather not see another day, let alone another play, if I have to hear about the birth of your baby, naming the child, or their arrival home like it mattered to everyone. If this constitutes a digital life raft, please, let me drown. And if that was the point, it was poorly made.

David Rawle and Una Kavanagh in The Delirium Archive. Image, Ros Kavanagh

Not so much suspending disbelief as euthanising it, The Delirium Project is too serious to be satire, too real to be absurd, and lacks dramatic intensity and well developed ideas, both about as substantial as soundbites. Like a 1950s Sci-Fi movie, or a weak episode of The Twilight Zone, it looks dated and feels weighted by a literary wordiness. A Humpty Dumpty all the king’s men, and women, couldn’t save. And many try, valiantly. A hugely impressive set by Ellen Kirk, superlative lighting by Sarah Jane Shiels, trippy videos by Eoin Robinson and Covid costumes by Sorcha Ni Fhloinn try their damnedest. As do a terrific cast. Ronan Leahy’s fiery Dad and Una Kavanagh’s vibrant Mum, Megan McDonnell’s detailed Octavia and a brilliant David Rawle as the brother you hate to love are each superb. As is Ian Toner as The Collector, glitching like a replicant with some of its programming corrupted. Director Eoghan Carrick trying to whisk everything into a potent cocktail. But the ingredients are never ripe enough or else past their use by date. Even so, laughs when they infrequently arrive, are strong. Suggesting The Delirium Project might have been hugely enjoyable had it leaned into straight up comedy. For now; can anyone recommend a good marriage counsellor?

The Delirium Project by Shane Mac an Bhaird, presented by Rough Magic, runs at The Project Arts Centre till May 9.

For more information visit Project Arts Centre