Stepping Out

Theatrical collaboration: Malverne’s Danny Higgins directs ‘The Caretaker of Corofin’

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Director, actor, student and Malvernite, 21-year-old Daniel Higgins, has his hands full this summer directing his 28th production, an original play called “The Caretaker of Corofin,” which premieres July 2 at the Theater for the New City in Manhattan.
Based on the 1986 summer trip of one of the performers, Caretaker tells the story of an American traveling in Ireland, and inadvertently becoming a suspect following the sudden death of a man in Corofin.
The play has been a project in the work for the past six months, according to Higgins.
“One of the major things we have been working on is creating this as an ensemble piece,” said Higgins.
“We’re taking modern Irish modern folk songs and incorporating them into the transitions in the play. The players move symbolically to music to portray what they’re going through,” added Higgins.
Caretaker communicates the American’s perspective abroad, how a small Irish town reacts to a sudden death, and looking beneath the surface and finding beauty, pain, longing and dreams.
The play was inspired by the experiences of performer Deborah Kruel Rupy, and has been fictionalized and altered significantly for the stage. Rupy is also a founder of the Textile Co., which will be presenting the play. Higgins is its resident director.
In Caretaker, a minimalist approach is applied to many different facets of the story: the actors sit on a bar but don’t have alcohol in their glasses; they appear in front of a chessboard but it has no pieces; someone is riding a bike, but they’re only holding handle bars. Caretaker is very focused on the actors, and makes them the center of attention. It pulls the audience in, and engages them in a way that emotionally connects them to the characters.
“The story is a portrait of a town and a certain time,” Higgins said. “After a man dies suddenly, people have to explain what happened. They get to know each other and themselves.”

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