The Irish Studies Program at Fairfield University will celebrate the fifth anniversary of its Irish in Film Series with six free screenings of plays by acclaimed Anglo-Irish playwright John Millington Synge. The films are all live, stage productions directed by Gary Hynes of the Druid Theatre Company, Galway, Ireland.
The film series is free and open to the public and light refreshments will be served.
All films, produced in Dublin in 2007, will be screened in the DiMenna-Nyselius Library multimedia room on Wednesdays at 7 p.m., except the first film, which will begin at 7:30 p.m. The film series is part of Fairfield's Arts & Minds season of cultural and intellectual programming.
On April 11, Dr. Pearson will introduce the final film, "The Well of the Saints" (1905). The three-act play concerns two blind old beggars, Martin Doul (Eamon Morrissey) and his ugly wife Mary (Marie Mullen), who sit by the roadside in all kinds of weather, and are cruelly mocked by the locals. When the couple's sight is miraculously restored, the theme of the play - the conflict between illusion and reality, the dream world and the visible world - is crystal clear.
For more information, contact Marion White, Irish Studies Program, at (203) 254-4000, ext. 3021 or mwhite@fairfield.edu.