Fragile: First Time Playwright Strikes Gold

As you may have heard the Dublin Gay Theatre Festival is now taking place across our fair city with a slew of big shows coming to town. I'm still trying to figure out what to see (Billy Redden is on my list for sure) but I did make my way to the first performance (and world premiere no less) of Fragile on Monday. It was rather good. So good in fact that I only went and wrote a review about it. Imagine that:

Having built up a strong amount of pre festival buzz many are eager to see Aaron Rodgers' debut play Fragile at this year's Dublin Gay Theatre Festival. As you may or may not know by now Rogers is just 18, not that you'g guess from the depth of writing on display in Fragile. Co-directing his first professional piece (alongside talented director/actor Roisin Watson) and with a script he wrote himself, Fragile is a terrific achievement. It deftly manages to take a youth centric view on love, relationships and sexuality without veering into cringe worthy territory. 

Telling the story of Nick (played by Denis Grindel who puts in an intense and charismatic performance throughout), a young gay guy looking for love in all the right and wrong places, it's an enthralling peak inside the mind of a young gay man. Backed by the male and female sides of his mind (who are in constant tease mode with Nick, the audience and each other throughout) we slowly piece together the feelings and obsessions of a generation of gay youth with the vocabulary to express how they are feeling but only a tenth of the experience to understand it. Fragile does a fine job of mixing humour and angst alongside some beautiful staging, terrific performances (the back and forth between Janna Fee and Fergus McCarthy is a joy to watch) and scarily assured writing. An absorbing and enjoyable play that is well worth a look.


Fragile runs until Saturday the 8th of May, at the Cobalt Cafe on North Great George's Street. Book yourself a ticket here