Munster Express Online

This week sees Stagemad Theatre Company bring Tom O’Brien’s acclaimedone-man play JohnJo to Waterford for the first time with five performances at Central Arts. Stagemad has drafted in the services of nationally acclaimed actor Eamon Culloty to play the titular character JohnJo.

Author Tom O’Brien originally hails from Kilmacthomas and is a full time writer, playwright and poet. He has also recently published two collections of poetry, and his renowned body of work includes: Money from America, Cricklewood Cowboys, Frightening the Crows, Falling from Grace and Gilmartin. This is the first time JohnJo will be performed for a ‘home’ audience in Waterford.

JohnJo is the story of an Irish man told from the cradle to the grave. Forced to go on the run from his rural Irish homeplace, JohnJo hides out in war-time England. There, forced to find menial work on farms, he finds himself treated worse than a prisoner of war. When he quits to return to a life of crime, he falls in with the dubious company of Bannaher, and so begins his life-long association with ‘The Lump’ and the dark underbelly of the construction business.

Stagemad’s JohnJo runs nightly at Central Arts this week until Saturday 26 September.