Terminus : The Abbey Theatre at ArtsEmerson (Boston)
L.to R. Catherine Walker, Declan Conlon, Olwen Fouéré in Terminus
The Abbey Theatre’s production of Mark O’Rowe’s extraordinary Terminus is the final work of ArtsEmerson’s mini-Irish festival. (The other two were Kathrine Bates’ The Color of Rose and Martin McDonagh’s The Cripple of Inishmaan.) Terminus is formally constructed: three characters – two women and a man – speaking monologues in verse, much of it rhyming. It observes the unities of time, place, and action: the tale they tell transpired over a single night, they remain in one place throughout, and the action is simply to recount.