View from the Green Room: ‘Dance first. Think later. It's the natural order’
Swinging June at Garter Lane
The space of what’s left unsaid is often more powerful than the said. Waterford actress/playwright/film script writer Katie Honan’s powerful short film of a Parkinson’s-struck woman, terrified of revealing her limited movement, disturbed concentration and shaking hands, is beautifully scripted and powerfully performed by the superb Billie Traynor (June), the excellent Sarah Morris (carer Regina) and a sparkling eight-year-old Waterford actress Faye Walsh (Alice).
This is the story of the old who are really old. The hyphenated old: old-and-lonely, old-and-grieving, old-and-desperate, old-and-afraid. And the fear of what happens to the human soul if it is isolated, and withers, and all but dies.
June’s day is occupied with just getting by and masking her fear of disclosure – of no longer being the person she once was and whose identity is slowly being swallowed by fear, isolation and loneliness. When the net curtains blow gently aside, we move inside a house that is as large as any character because it’s June’s fortress prison. An isolated soul no longer able to communicate across a gulf of weariness and despair.
June’s got a dream, however. She wants to dance with her adorable little friend and chatterbox granddaughter Alice on her communion day but she’s afraid of exposing herself as a frailer version of herself. A once-confident younger woman who loved to dance with her now deceased husband.
She makes excuses. "Toby the cat’s not well," and she explains to Alice that "she won’t be able to make her big day". No one buys her cat-took-my homework excuse. Least of all little Alice or Polish carer Regina. No-nonsense Regina is having none of it either and sets about visiting Alice every morning for chair dance/yoga. The morning ding-dong of the bell as the golden-marmaladed slice of toast tells its own delicious story, and when two slices pop up in a celebratory phrase of music, that bell sounds like a symphony.
Well…you can guess the rest of the narrative of this adorable feel-good short film that’s suffused with love of family and the devotion of friends.
This is a film that is beautifully understated, that celebrates the power of intimacy and the redemptive power of performative art through dance. As Samuel Beckett puts it: ‘Dance first. Think later. It's the natural order.’ The static 4:3 camera shoot looks into June’s self-confinement and the gentle journey of transforming the outside-in nature of June’s life to an inside-out experience of life’s tapestry is the drama’s path. The film is deliberately short on dialogue but is rich in resonance and, although set in the present, has a timeless feel to its storyline.
Inspired direction from Katie Honan and Federico Rea, towering performances from Billie Traynor, Sarah Morris and Faye Walsh, with strong local support from Waterford City and County Council, Waterford Film Centre, Creative Ireland Programme, Treacy's Hotel and the Tower Hotel makes ‘Swinging June’ a delight.
You just can’t beat good writing.
