Theatre Review: The Last Hotel at O’Reilly Theatre, Dublin Theatre Festival
There is much that is thrilling about Enda Walsh’s collaboration with composer Donnacha Dennehy, not least the violent, quivering live score from Crash Ensemble which comes off like Steve Reich expropriating a Hitchcock soundtrack and amping up all the delirium, but not before installing an escape-valve of wind instrumentation into the manic strings and keys.
In fact, that idea of a sonic escape-valve is quite resonant. Walsh’s drama centres on a young woman (Claudia Boyle) who enlists an English couple (Robin Adams, Katherine Manley) to help her kill herself in a garish Irish hotel.
