Declan Mooney, Michael Mellamphy, Rod Brogan, Rob Donahue and Sheffield Chastain play a dangerous round in Palm Beach Drazmwortks’ The Seafarer (Photo by Jason Nuttle)
By Jan Sjostrom
If the characters in The Seafarer really were sailors, they’d be shipwrecked. Their home lives are in shambles. Not one has made much of a mark in life. Their only goal seems to be scoring their next drink.
Spending an evening with them at Palm Beach Dramaworks could try the patience of any sober audience member. On top of that, the show takes a long time to pick up steam and reveal the flashes of brilliance that might make the wait worthwhile.
Conor McPherson’s play takes place over a single day on Christmas Eve in a Dublin suburb. James “Sharky” Harkin, a drunk with a string of brutal fistfights and failures behind him, has returned home to care for his brother Richard, recently blinded by a drunken encounter with a dumpster.
It’s not a happy homecoming. Richard constantly barks orders at Sharky and ridicules his brother’s two-day-old resolution to swear off alcohol. He neglects personal hygiene, impulsively ignores his disability and demands endless refills from bottles stashed around the house. Sharky holds his tongue with difficulty.
The brothers are joined for the holiday by their equally alcoholic pals, Ivan and Nicky, and a mysterious guest Nicky has brought with him, the incongruously suave Mr. Lockhart.
Sheltered from the storm outside in Richard’s two-story, wood-paneled home, the men entertain themselves with rounds of poker. The true stakes of the game don’t become clear to the audience until Sharky is briefly left alone with Mr. Lockhart. Let’s just say that Lockhart is not exactly human and he’s come to collect on a promise Sharky made 25 years ago, when Lockhart freed him from a sticky situation. Sharky’s fate will be determined by whether he can beat Lockhart at cards.
McPherson’s impressive credits might lead audiences to expect more of The Seafarer than Dramaworks delivers. He’s a successful stage and screen writer, with a career that spans directing as well. His projects range from the Olivier Award-winning The Weir, the Bob Dylan juke-box musical Girl from the North Country, an adaptation of Anton Chekov’s Uncle Vanya and an immersive version of The Hunger Games, booked through October 2026 in a purpose-built theater in London.
McPherson has a painful past with the bottle. But drawing on the long tradition of Irish storytelling and his degrees in philosophy and English, he’s not interested in serving up a cautionary tale about the dangers of drink.
He probes what lies behind the alcoholic haze to ponder deeper questions of existence, such as how the scales might tip if we reach heaven’s gate, what makes life worthwhile and what happens after death.
The play draws its title from an Old English poem, dating from the tenth century or earlier, in which a mariner muses on the hardships of a life at sea and Christian morality.
Dramaworks’ uneven production, helmed by director J. Barry Lewis, is often disappointingly flat. The over-long first act consists mainly of drunken banter and testy exchanges between Richard and Sharky. After a while the talk begins to resemble a one-note tune, lacking subtlety and the quicksilver emotions of authentic conversation.
That’s not to say there aren’t bright spots. Sheffield Chastain as Ivan is gifted with spot-on timing and loose-limbed physical eloquence. Ivan bumbles good-naturedly wherever he goes, topples onto the couch with morning-after exhaustion and shudders with distaste when Richard offers him his bed after learning his friend spent the night on the floor.
Rob Donohoe’s Richard is so bull-headed he deserves a spanking, which is in line with the character’s child-like glee at inventing Christmasy excuses for acquiring another drink.
The pace picks up when Lockhart, skillfully portrayed by Rod Brogan, enters the room, exuding oily bonhomie before breaking the bad news in private to Sharky with cold-eyed ruthlessness.
That moment falls short of the shock value it deserves. Sharky’s tearful collapse as Lockhart towers overhead feels stagy, perhaps because the lighting is as bright as that of a hospital operating room.
The second act is a big improvement on the first. The stakes get increasingly higher in the pals’ poker game, to say nothing of Sharky’s and Lockhart’s private game, about which the others are unaware.
Polite masks slip, as does Sharky’s sobriety. In Act One, Declan Mooney’s portrayal of Sharky is restrained. But he bares all of Sharky’s desperation and self-loathing when the character gives in to his familiar pain-killer.
Control abandoned, Sharky attacks Nicky, played as a weak braggart by Michael Mellamphy. Sharky has his reasons. Nicky has moved in with Sharky’s ex and makes the mistake of calling him a nutcase.
Brogan’s Lockhart becomes increasingly interesting. Here’s where McPherson is at his poetic best. Lockhart behaves like a rejected lover as he jabs bitterly at the Christian God. His descriptions of the hell where he threatens to banish Sharky are bone-chilling.
Donohoe’s one-track Richard reveals an unexpected simple faith in God and in the possibility of redemption for his troubled brother.
As usual, Dramaworks’ production is well packaged. Although Anne Mundell’s stage-filling set is too cozy to be called squalid, as Richard’s home is supposed to be, it’s beautifully crafted. Other contributors include costume designer Brian O’Keefe, lighting designer Genny Wynn and sound designer Roger Arnold.
Some audience members might find the Irish accents and slang challenging. The program contains a helpful glossary of terms used in the show.
Dramaworks advertises The Seafarer’s upbeat conclusion so that’s no secret. There’s hope, even for those who seem to be holding a losing hand.
The Seafarer runs through Dec. 28 at Palm Beach Dramaworks, 201 Clematis St., West Palm Beach. Except for the week of Dec. 21, performances are held at 7:30 p.m. on Wednesday through Saturday and 2 p.m. on Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday. There will be no shows on Dec. 24 and Dec. 25, but matinee and evening performances will be held on Dec. 22 and Dec. 23. Tickets cost $95. Students with valid K-12 or college IDs pay $15 and anyone less than 40 with a photo ID pays $40. Half-price tickets are available for educators and active military personnel with valid IDs, though other restrictions could apply. The show runs for two hours, plus a 15-minute intermission. For information, call (561) 514-4042 or visit palmbeachdramaworks.org.
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