INTERVIEW: Maeve Higgins heads home to Cork in Irish Rep’s ‘Autumn Royal’
Photo: Maeve Higgins and John Keating star in Kevin Barry’s Autumn Royal. Photo courtesy of Carol Rosegg / Provided by Matt Ross PR with permission.
Maeve Higgins is funny and creative, bringing thoughtful commentary to her stand-up routines, her writing and her comedy roles, including last year’s Extra Ordinary. Recently she’s been adding to her résumé with a new challenge: the off-Broadway production of Kevin Barry’s Autumn Royal, playing through Nov. 21 at the Irish Repertory Theatre in Manhattan.
In the show, which is directed by Ciarán Ó’Reilly, Higgins plays the character of May, someone who has halted her own dreams to stay at home and take care of her ailing father. By May’s side is her brother Timothy (John Keating), and throughout the 75-minute play the two siblings debate what to do with their dad and how they may be able to break from this mundane life and find happiness. To keep them occupied they often take to the windows of their flat and voyeuristically check in on the comings and goings of the neighbors.
For Higgins, this is a new adventure — and one that was written specifically for her.
“I met Kevin Barry many years ago in Ireland, and I love his writing,” the actor said in a recent phone interview. “He has seen me on stage a lot doing comedy, which is where I come from, a stand-up comedian, so he wrote the character of May with me in mind. That was about six years ago, but because I’m living in New York now, and the play first was on in Ireland, I didn’t get to do it until now. … But to me it felt like the one that got away because I couldn’t do it. They put it on in Cork, where it’s set, which is my hometown, and I wasn’t there, you know. That’s how I got involved.”
Higgins sees her character of May as someone who is trapped, sad and funny — as the actor said, a woman in a real pickle.
“Part of me was like, wait a second, why did he think of me?” Higgins said with a laugh. “I just got such a kick out of the character of May and her brother, too. I adore the brother character, Timmy. With Kevin Barry’s writing, his novels and his short stories, the characters are very light. The way they speak is just like the way people from my hometown speak, and they madness that’s in them is very familiar to me. So, yeah, when I read the script I was like, oh, she is amazing. No hesitation.”
Higgins said her own parents are healthy and in their 60s, so she has not had the exact same life as May, but she’s cognizant of the fact that at some point family members need assistance in their older age. She recognizes this for others, and even for herself.
“I will be an old person myself one day,” she said. “It’s coming for us all. That’s the kind of universal truth in this play, that all of us will age, and somebody will need to look after us. And what impact does that have on the person doing the caring? And so it’s a big presence in everybody’s life, and it’s one of those things that hangs there. I love that we get into it, and we talk about it in the play. It’s shown in all of its grittiness and its humor, too, because I think often with these family situations, where you’re just stuck with your family, you can’t get away from them. That’s all too familiar to all of us, I think.”
She can identify with May and Timothy looking out the windows of their flat and keeping in touch with the small dramas of the neighbors heading around town. Higgins called it a simultaneous real life (their father upstairs) and imagined life (what’s going on outside).
“I live in Brooklyn, and I’m always looking,” the actor said. “What’s she up to now? Well, he’s looking after the child today, that’s interesting. I also have Netflix myself and Instagram, so I don’t fully rely on what’s happening outside. But May and Timmy in the play, they have very little going on in their lives. They are the nosy neighbors, and I love how Kevin has written it. You can envision the whole neighborhood through their own observations.”
There’s a running joke in the comedy that Timothy is hoping to break free of Ireland and head to Australia, perhaps to go surfing in the ocean. May, as Higgins portrays her, doesn’t believe this dream of his will ever take place, but she also doesn’t want to tell him the truth.
“I think how May is with Timmy is kind of patient, but she knows him very well,” she said. “He’s not going anywhere, and it’s that balance of when you’re close to somebody, and you hear the same thing again and again, and you kind of play along with it because to pull the rug out from under them would be a little bit too cruel. But of course he’s not going to Australia. Tim is actually, I think, quite happy in his little life in Cork at the top of the hill, but he likes to, in a childlike way, imagine this other life for himself. But, no, he’s never going to do it.”
Although the play takes place indoors in this small flat in Cork, the city is very much another character in Autumn Royal. Higgins, who is now based in New York City, has fond memories of growing up in the Irish city.
“Cork is a small city, and it’s a very hilly city,” she said. “It’s very pretty. It’s full of stories, I would say. A lot of people who come from Cork turn out like me, which is we can make a story out of a trip to Dunkin’ Donuts, you know. I’m not sure why that is. I don’t know if it’s Irishness. … Kevin, the writer, he worked there as a reporter for many years in the courts there in Cork, so he picked up tons of grim, funny stories from being a courts reporter. And also the way we talk I think he captures it very well in this roundabout way, lots of cursing, this funny cadence. I’m so thrilled that it works in New York, to be honest, because I was thinking, oh my God, this is like being at home in the market on a Saturday the way they go on. I was like, are people going to get this? But it’s working, it’s translating.”
By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com
Autumn Royal, starring Maeve Higgins and John Keating, plays through Nov. 21 at the Irish Repertory Theatre in Manhattan. Click here for more information and tickets.
