Somebody and Nobody

Waterford actor Darren Malone stars in Stagemad Theatre Company’s production of Somebody & Nobody at Central Arts during the upcoming Imagine Arts Festival.
This dark revenge comedy, written by Cork playwright Ian Wild, revolves around two housemates who are polar opposites. Darren plays Nobody (opposite Richard Clare’s Somebody) in what will be his fifteenth (yes, FIFTEENTH) stage production of 2015.
“Yeah, this will be my fifteenth show this show. I’ll be divorced before I’m even married at this stage. Over the last few months, I’ve done West Side Story with Theatrebox, I’ve done Someone Who’ll Watch Over Me with my own production company Beretta Productions, I’ve done Sister Act with Ignite Productions, as well as a Night at the Musicals and Awesome 80s and then Somebody and Nobody has toured to Cork, Dublin and Kilkenny since it opened about 6 months ago. So it’s been fairly mental, alright. The week after this show, I’m in Gasworks’ The Staffroom and then that’s it for this year. I think!”
Darren first caught the acting bug at the age of seven, when he performed with Little Red Kettle.
“I was in Little Red Kettle’s first ever show, The Four Euclids of Squid and the Festival of Imagination and Wild Fancy. I was involved in theatre on and off over the years but I really got into it about nine years ago and I’d say I’ve acted with every production company in Waterford since.”
Directed by James Power, Somebody & Nobody revolves around two housemates whose characters tend to clash as they live their lives in an unconventional world. Somebody is possibly the most important person who has ever lived, in comparison to Nobody, an inconsequential person with twelve mothers, twelve fathers and over a million friends who never visit. When a blank sheet of paper enters the lives of both men, it fires up a sequence of events in which their relationship gets taken on a chaotic and comedic ride, according to Darren.
“The show is very Monty Python. These two characters are very gullible people who live together in this one room. Somebody considers himself very important and then Nobody is kind of his servant but at one point the tables turn and then utter madness breaks out. The action on stage is so fast…the whole thing is an hour long and it goes at breakneck speed. And it’s chaotic. At one stage I’m speaking from under a black sack…I find out a secret about Somebody that he’s not happy about so he makes me put the bag over my head and stand out for the binmen to collect me. The whole thing is mad, you’d have to see it to understand. After we performed the show in Maynooth, a girl came over to us and she was crying with the laughing…she said it was the most absurd thing she’d ever seen. I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing but she seemed to enjoy it. I think Waterford audiences will as well.”
* Somebody and Nobody runs at Central Arts on 15th and 16th October. Tickets are priced at just €10 and are on sale now from www.centralarts.ie