Theatre choice

Mark (Paul Roe) arrives at the home of Irish ex-pat Francis (Catherine Byrne) in Madras, India, to take his wife, Jane (Elizabeth Moynihan, above), home to her son. He finds that Jane is determined to spend the rest of her life working in a children’s shelter, following the example of the charismatic charity worker Srinivas (Gabeen Kane, above). Helen Edmundson’s drama puts western values under the microscope, questioning our commitment to self-sacrifice on behalf of the less privileged. But while the emotional heart of the play is the tug-of-love between pragmatic Mark, idealistic Jane and the Svengali-like Srinivas, the personal is overwhelmed by the political, the characters becoming mouthpieces for lectures on economic imperialism. But the director, Joe Devlin, never allows the pace to flag, and conjures up an exotic atmosphere, helped by compelling performances from Roe and Kane and sound work from Conor Hanratty.