Written by Carys D. Coburn with MALAPROP
Directed by Claire O’Reilly
Cast: Peter Corboy, Thommas Kane Byrne, Bláithín Mac Gabhann, Maeve O'Mahony, Ebby O'Toole Acheampong
Set & Costume Design by Molly O'Cathain
Composition, Musical Direction and Sound by Anna Clock
Lighting Design by John Gunning
Choreographer Deirdre Griffin
Assistant Director Ellen Buckley
Associate Sound Designer & Sound Engineer Eóin Murphy
Produced by Carla Rogers & Caoimhe Whelan
Costume Supervisor Mary Sheehan
Stage Manager Evie McGuinness
Assistant Stage Manager Dragana Stevanic
Production Manager Pete Jordan
Promo Photography by Pato Cassinoni with Art Direction by Molly O’Cathain
WINNER BEST PRODUCTION AND BEST DESIGN ENSEMBLE AT DUBLIN FRINGE FESTIVAL 2023
“Molly O’Cathain’s on-point set and costumes meld orange-dominated burning with a showbiz aesthetic, creating a space that feels at once glitzy and apocalyptic. The entire piece is bathed in John Gunning’s lurid lighting, oscillating between the comic and the catastrophic. The effect is a visual fever dream that underscores the absurd urgency of the play’s environmental theme.” — The Irish Times, Hothouse review, September 2023
“Molly O’Cathain’s vision for the set and costumes is spectacularly realised in an ‘Austin Powers’-like, orange-hued extravaganza. The audience is plunged into a pulsing, neon-lit dream of pop-culture absurdity, the visual language perfectly mirroring Malaprop’s trademark mix of irony, wit, and intellectual play. O’Cathain’s design is both parody and homage, situating the show halfway between disco satire and eco-fable.” — The Reviews Hub, Hothouse, Project Arts Centre
“Enriched by Molly O’Cathain’s sun-scorched, minimalist set and wacky costumes, superbly illuminated by John Gunning’s lights, Hothouse is an almost operatic exercise in theatrical control. The design works like a heatwave hallucination: surfaces shimmer, fabrics clash, and colours flare until they collapse into something near beauty. O’Cathain’s design evokes both the utopian optimism of 1970s futurism and the exhaustion of a planet pushed to its limit.” — The Arts Review, Dublin Fringe Festival 2023: Hothouse
“Molly O’Cathain’s set and costume design, sumptuously lit with rich, saturated color by John Gunning, feel somehow glam and melancholy at the same time; the blazing oranges and deep blues are always just a little too bright, trying a little too hard. The visual world is one of manic beauty — a fevered optimism that keeps threatening to unravel. It’s a perfect echo of Hothouse’s anxious humour and desperate environmental reckoning.” — Loren Noveck, Exeunt NYC, Hothouse at Irish Arts Center
“Molly O’Cathain’s aggressively orange set and costumes conjure a 1970s Euro-variety television show, eventually giving way to the full spectrum of colors as we approach the near-future. The transition from artificial brightness to genuine darkness is one of the production’s most striking visual gestures. John Gunning’s lighting, in partnership with O’Cathain’s playful aesthetic, transforms the space into a theatre of entropy — a world literally burning through its palette.”
— TheaterMania, Review: Hothouse at Irish Arts Center
“The production design — Molly O’Cathain’s orange-inflected scenery and costumes, John Gunning’s lighting and Anna Clock’s sound — blends absurdist theatricality with the aesthetics of late-night television. The design team conjures a space that feels like both a studio and a greenhouse, where entertainment and ecological collapse coexist in disturbing harmony.” — Lighting & Sound America, Hothouse feature
Originally scheduled to premiere in March 2020 – this is a new play with songs and a ship's captain pulling the strings. Ruth in 1969 refuses to eat sandwiches with lettuce in them. Ali in the present day goes on a cruise to say goodbye to the ice. A parent 100 years in the future tells their child it gets better, even though we're pretty sure they're lying. HOTHOUSE is about horny songbirds, parents, love, legacy, and wanting to change, but not knowing how.
With HOTHOUSE, MALAPROP once again make big ideas urgently human. And funny! This show is not just One More Thing to Feel Scared About. We promise. Climate breakdown is so huge that feeling bad is too small a feeling to really do it justice. So why not laugh about death? Why not do a drag cabaret about bees going extinct? Why not play some banging tunes while the ship sinks?
Come along: Laugh. (Loudly.) Panic. (Controlledly.) Think about needing to change (desperately), but not knowing how. Written by Carys D. Coburn with MALAPROP, HOTHOUSE is a new play with songs – about cruise ships, horny songbirds, parents, love, legacy, horny rabbits, Minnie Riperton, and whether things can ever get better.
