Mike Daisey’s theatre of protest

Mike Daisey’s bid to understand the global financial crisis took him not to the heart of Wall St, or the City of London, or the hedge fund mecca of Dublin’s IFSC, but to a tiny volcanic island in the middle of the Pacific.

The story of how, and why, he got there makes up what is likely to be one of the most intriguing shows of the summer, as Daisey, a sort of Michael Moore-on-stage, takes his one-man roadshow to Cork, Clonmel and Donegal in the coming weeks (details below).

Truckers, gamers & Rimini Protokoll

What do a pair of Bulgarian truckers and a female Indian call-centre worker have in common?

And what have they got to do with the theatre?

They were three of the most disarming performers I’ve seen in recent years. And they were brought to the Dublin stage by the same theatre company, an intriguing German outfit called Rimini Protokoll.

David McWilliams: An outsider at the theatre

There was a scrum outside the entrance to the Abbey Theatre, but it wasn’t for tickets.

There were raised voices, and a knot of people pushed against the glass doors.

It looked like it could get ugly. But it was simply the free market in action.

At the centre of the group, a man was selling prescription medicines. The others were junkies, thrusting cash at him, craving a slow-release hit.

The guards let them be. Inside the Abbey, the staff were nonplussed.

David Hare: putting the banks on trial, on stage

Do you believe Brian Lenihan or David McWilliams? IBEC or the Unions? Were the bankers gangsters, or simply suffering from hubris?

If conflict is at the heart of drama, then the collapse of the Irish economy should have proved a goldmine for dramatists. A society swept up by irrational exuberance; lone voices shouting stop; pantomime villains; and as many different interpretations of the crisis as there were characters: all the ingredients of good drama were there.

We’ll see the social effects of the downturn on the Irish stage soon, no doubt: Irish theatre has always been good at documenting the intimate minutiae of Irish lives and communities. But it has rarely risen to the challenge of responding rapidly to great political and cultural events.