Theatre

Sarah Keating: Owen Roe conveys complex emotions in stirring new production of The Steward of Christendom

The actor brings a violence of emotion and a deep vulnerability to the figure of Thomas Dunne in the Gate’s new staging of Sebastian Barry's 1995 play

Owen Roe in The Steward of Christendom, running until September 3 at the Gate theatre in Dublin before going on tour

In Sebastian Barry's 1995 memory play The Steward of Christendom, Thomas Dunne, a former peacekeeper with the Dublin Metropolitan Police, is visited by ghosts of the past as he lies on his deathbed. Louise Lowe’s stirring new production – the first since the play premiered at the Gate with legendary actor Donal McCann in the leading role – opens with the figure of Dunne (Owen Roe) prone in his iron bed in the Wicklow county ...