Jilly Morgan’s Birthday Party is a story of love, longing and obsession, centring on Jack, and his experience of a brief, passionate kiss in the downstairs toilet at a party in Limerick City in 1983. The incident becomes Jack’s lifelong fixation. He kissed Jilly Morgan, at her own birthday party, and life, for him, will never be the same again.
Jilly Morgan’s Birthday Party takes place across four decades, this is an exciting, time-bending and darkly humorous piece of new writing about the rise and fall of a fantasy. It is a condensed social history and a portrait of a city.
The play, though radically reimagined, is inspired by Anton Chekhov’s short story The Kiss.
Written by Liam McCarthy | Directed by Joan Sheehy
**** Four star Irish Times review by Mary Coll
**** Four star Feeling Good review by Chris McCormack
Audience reactions:
“I think everyone could relate to these characters, it was brilliant, powerful, moving and funny”
“Pivoting from laughs to darkness and back again. Extraordinary performances and beautiful writing. Go see it!”