Monday, 25-August-2025


Brendan Gleeson is one of those actors who I’ll always remember as the first character I saw him play – “Monk” GcGinn, in Gangs of New York.

Now, that does make it interesting when I saw him on stage here in Dublin, playing an aged mechanic from a small town in the countryside of Ireland… but it also kind of worked – In my own head, maybe he survived the movie, and made it to retirement back in his homeland?

That fun mental idea aside, I’ll have to be honest – I wasn’t overly enthused about The Weir.

As I understand it, it’s a “chamber play”, with a single set, minimal scene changes, and minimal conflict or resolution. It’s interesting, and I can’t fault any of the actors, but I simply didn’t find it particularly interesting or engrossing. It was… there. The stories were told, the acting was lovely, and I left the theater feeling like nothing significant had really happened.

Now, I recognize that the play is supposedly one of the best of the modern scene… and I don’t doubt that the cast was top notch.

That doesn’t change my view, though. I’m glad we saw it, no two ways about it, and the theater was absolutely beautiful… but I don’t think I’d go see it again.