When it comes to St. Patrick’s Day, Philly’s Inis Nua Theatre — driven by contemporary plays from Ireland, Wales, Scotland and Great Britain such as ‘Iphigenia in Splott’ — sketch and improvisational comedy act Foil Arms & Hog, and Irish Heritage Theatre’s ‘The Beauty Queen of Leenane’ are ripe with Celtic spirit.
Here’s the latest on Philadelphia’s theater scene.
‘The Beauty Queen of Leenane’
If you’re a fan of Irish playwright Martin McDonagh’s twisted brand of dark comedy and hilariously quirky violence — think Oscar-nominated screenplays ‘In Bruges’ and ‘The Banshees of Inisherin’ — his obsessive, absurdly goth-comic ‘The Beauty Queen of Leenane’ is for you.
Staged through Irish Heritage Theatre at Plays and Players (1714 Delancey Street) through March 23, ‘Beauty Queen’ stars Mary Pat Walsh, Rob Hargraves, Kirsten Quinn and Brian Anthony Wilson.
Foil Arms & Hog
Ireland’s top, most viral comedy trio Foil Arms & Hog open their Skittish US Comedy Tour at Keswick Theatre on March 19. Sean Finegan (Foil), Conor McKenna (Arms), and Sean Flanagan (Hog) know their name is odd, but is based on their roles within the trio, and hope their brand stick in the US, “like the Lynard Skynyrd of comedy,” says Finegan.
“At school, we weren’t all serious with Shakespeare and Pinter, but just wanted to do silly things all the time,” says Flanagan of their auspicious meeting in drama school. “We always loved… fun, so the three of us then, naturally moved into improvisational and sketch comedy, and make the audience part of our show.”
Influenced by classic comedy such as Jim Carrey’s stand-up, Robin Williams’ freestyle improvs and the Marx Brothers’ vaudevillian skills, Foil Arms & Hog have a modern leg up on success due to its billion+ TikTok audience.
“Much of our stuff is already short form, so what we do works well on social media, lashed out in bare bones,” states Finegan.
“We’re not on the telly, so Instagram, YouTube and TikTok is how we get seen when we’re not on stage,” adds Flanagan.
While this is Foil Arms & Hogs first proper tour of the US, they have sold out in NYC and Chicago in the recent past, with an “overly-appreciative crowd who applauded way too long before they even bloody saw us perform,” laughs Finegan. “Americans are the quintessential hype-man nation… we’d get a sigh and a groan in Ireland if we didn’t immediately win our crowd over,” teases Flanagan.
At Philly’s Keswick and beyond, Foil Arms & Hog won’t take on any of their online-fan-favorites, but instead lash out with an all-new program of silly walks, bizarre characters and oddball sketches like “our avant-garde eating crisps experiments for as long as we can get away with it” bit and our “most mad, clever satirical work ever.”
Flanagan says of Foil, Arms & Hog’s Skittish show, “we don’t know just how we get away with it all – but we do.”
‘Iphigenia in Splott’
For Inis Nua’s Philly premiere of Welsh playwright Gary Owen’s ‘Iphigenia in Splott‘ at the Drake (March 12-30), local actor Campbell O’Hare takes on a role of the town drunk during a harrowing time of heroism and sacrifice for her embattled community in a contemporary interpretation of ancient Greek myth. The myth that playwright Owen spins from may be aged, but O’Hare believes local audiences will find much to love.
“Though it comes from far away and takes inspiration from long ago, ‘Splott’ deals intimately with people — always the most interesting thing,” says O’Hare. “And, I love Effie—she’s fierce, funny, and f**ked up. This myth of a woman willingly sacrificing herself on the altar of war sometimes paints women as angels. Effie is not an angel. But she is special. The sacrifice she makes is painful, nightmarish, and one she never should have had to make. She lives to tell the tale and gives us the gift of her story. It’s a hard road, this play, but I hope audiences look at each other, and at women like Effie, with fresh eyes, realizing anew that we belong to each other, that we’re a community.”
In further consideration of community and what it means to be a theater artist within the currency of our democracy in 2025, and the ongoing possibility of cuts to the arts, O’Hare is pragmatic.
“Art is reflective of, and responsive to, the time in which it is made, so there is plenty of food for thought in our day,” says O’Hare. “Effie says it in ‘Splott’s’ final scene: ‘More and more people packed into this little plot of land while they cut everything we need to make a life. It seems it’s always places like this, and people like us who have to take it when the time for cutting comes… What’s gonna happen, when we can’t take it anymore? I wonder.'”
O’Hare goes on, to close, “I’m grateful to embody Effie’s rage at this moment.”
