Santa Monica Playhouse Benefit Series and
Heather Woodbury’s Fomenting Arts Unlimited Incorporated
present

or call: 1-323-960-7780
(Tickets for this production are not available through
the Santa Monica Playhouse Box Office)

An outrageous antidote to Riverdance

WHAT

Celebrate St Patrick’s Day with this uproarious one-woman comedy that asks what it means to be Irish, what it means if you don’t want to be, and what if you’re labeled an Irish Wannabe?  London Irish writer-performer Máire Clerkin, who cut her teeth in the 80’s alternative comedy scene with an act called The Hairy Marys, relives her past with tales of the disappointing daughter of an Irish dancing-school mistress, ugly duckling syndrome, cultural confusion and a life dedicated to work avoidance.

“…glorious riffs of traditional Irish dance…animated impersonations and snapshot transitions in a world that Clerkin captures so meticulously”
LA Weekly (Theater Pick)

written and performed by: Máire Clerkin

Máire Clerkin moved to California in 2003 from London.  She is the founder of The Hairy Marys and Clerkinworks Irish Dance Theatre, both of which have toured the UK & Ireland extensively. Credits include Dancing on Dangerous Ground at Radio City Music Hall; Fennels, Flannels, Funnels at John Hegley; Centenary Knees Up at South Bank Centre; Unconnected Soundings at The Royal Opera House; Music Makers on BBC TV; and Revolver on BBC World Service. Clerkin has created five award-winning choreodramas for Irish Dance Academies since 2006.  She directed Cadence Dance Theatre in Arizona (2004-05) and A Gaelic Gathering for the World City series at Disney Concert Hall in ‘07. In 2009, she was awarded a Durfee Foundation grant for an eight performance series of The Bad Arm at the Bang Theatre in Hollywood where it played to rave reviews and enthusiastic audiences. Now updated and staged for Santa Monica Playhouse, The Bad Arm – Confessions of a Dodgy Irish Dancer arrives on the Westside in all its glory. Máire Clerkin is a teaching artist with the LA Music Center and Orange County Performing Arts Center.

directed by: Dan O'Connor

Dan O’Connor is co-founder of Impro Theatre, (Top 10 Best Theatre of 2009, LA Weekly), co-director for Jane Austen UnScripted, Shakespeare UnScripted and Sondheim UnScripted. Theatre credits include Improbable Theatre’s Lifegame (Off-Broadway), A Christmas Carol, Horatio, and Puck in A Midsummer Night’s Dream at A Noise Within (Dramalogue Award for Best Actor), Ferdinand in The Tempest at Shakespeare Santa Cruz, and Joey in The Homecoming at The New Conservatory in San Francisco. TV credits include Seinfeld, Campus Ladies, Malcolm in the Middle, and The Newz. O’Conner co-created the NBC/ION television improv comedy show World Cup Comedy. His TV directing credits include Sons and Daughters and Campus Ladies. 

St. Patrick’s Day
 

Wednesday, March 17

8:00 pm

Santa Monica Playhouse
The Main Stage

Santa Monica Playhouse
1211 4th Street
Santa Monica, CA 90401

$17
 

(All proceeds benefit the Save the
Santa Monica Playhouse Campaign)


 

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Santa Monica Playhouse, a not-for-profit 501 (c) 3 educational corporation founded in 1960, provides exciting and entertaining dramatic and comedic, classic and contemporary live theatrical productions, Family Theatre musicals, birthday and tea parties, year-round and summer theatre acting classes and educational programming for kids, teens and adults, create-a-play classes and Mommy and Me events for pre-schoolers, daytime and after school field trips,  enrichment classes and in-service in public and private schools, cultural exchange, international touring, and community outreach, as well as theatre rental space for productions, seminars, solo shows, concerts, recitals, lectures, meetings and more.