‘silence in the house, not a sound, only the fire, no flames now,
embers. Embers.’

Henry sits on a beach, remembering and imagining stories and incidents from his life, tormented by his father’s suicide, his own disfunctional family history and his failure as a writer. Hallucinations and reality merge as he attempts to stoke the fire of his creativity.

First broadcast on radio in 1959, Embers takes us on a journey into the haphazard world of Henry’s imagination, a world of ever-shifting mental leaps, ruminations and ambiguities where creative storytelling and unfinished memories both real and unreal coalesce into one. Was Henry’s father washed out to sea while taking his evening swim, or did he commit suicide?

‘We never found your body, you know…’

Reviews and praise for Embers

"both he (Andrew Bennet) and Ni Mhuiri are pitch-perfect, directed by Gavin Quinn with impressive precision." "...the cumulative effect of this staging becomes riveting." Helen Meany, The Guardian, 4****

"The sheer rigorous intensity created by Quinn’s fusion of the wonderfully spoken voices, Aedín Cosgroves’s fluid, streamlike lighting and Jimmy Eadie’s remarkable sound design is mesmerising." Fintan O'Toole, The Irish Times

“...you come away with haunting images, some seen, some imagined: the dying fire, the washing surf, that arid outline of a skull, the fascinating shape and sound of nothingness.” Peter Crawley, The Irish Times

“The production (…) is as profoundly depressing as it is paradoxically desperately human. For this we have to thank Gavin Quinn’s direction, which elicits an agonised perfection from Andrew Bennett as Henry, matched by Áine NíMhuirí as Ada. Andrew Clancy is responsible for the towering skull sculpture, with magnificent lighting by Aedín Cosgrove and sound by Jimmy Eadie.” Emer O’Kelly, The Sunday Independent

"Embers…a fascinating experience watching it and there is much in the text…Aedín Cosgrove manages to transform the skull, so it becomes at times as if it’s swathed in bandages, bits of it seem to emerge and project and other times it seems like it’s laughing maniacally it’s very much an engaging experience…Go, and listen…” Sophie Gorman, Arena

“In a masterful display of subtle lighting and, at times, truly terrifying sound design, this performance is one that will haunt an audience.” Alan Farrell, Totally Dublin

"Pan Pan's exquisite production rings with the powerful voice of Andrew Bennett, and an expert sound design by Jimmy Eadie. But nothing fixates like Clancy's skull sculpture: an object so intensely present that it redirects our gaze inwards, behind our skin, our flesh. It feels greater than a piece of theatrical scenography; it's an object of visual art that contains just as much primacy as the dramatic art of the performance." Chris McCormack, Musings In Intermissions

Check out this interview of co-director Gavin Quinn on Vimeo http://vimeo.com/68445706