by Nikki Hoffpauir
Leaving Mullingar, we headed southwest to stop number 4 on the crisscross country tour to Ennis’s Glór Theatre.
We were only performing one show there so it was a quicker get in and get out than we’ve had in any of the other theaters. We arrived around 2:30 on Monday to meet our truck driver Liam with the set and jumped right to getting everything loaded in. Costumes and dressing room set up by Team Fabulous are down to a science by this point, so those went quickly, and the building crew had fewer adjustments to make than in Mullingar, so even the set went up in good time.
The biggest challenges here were that we couldn’t toe the set into the beautiful floor there for stability, so Mark and Colin and the others had to rework how to brace the set—in this case using 2x4s braced to the back wall. Glór’s stage is extremely wide so we also now had the opposite challenge of how to fill the space and bring the edges of the stage in for masking purposes. Once the set was up, we called it a night and headed into town to the Queens Hotel.
Ennis is a beautiful town, especially after dark when the narrow historic streets are alight with streetlamps and the lights from pubs and shops. 
Okay, it wasn’t the craziest of towns on a Monday night but we managed to enjoy the hell out of it nonetheless. Our only night off was spent having dinner, walking around, and otherwise checking out the town. It also happened to be Maboud’s birthday, so in true celebratory fashion, a group of us dined at Poet’s Corner/Town Hall Restaurant at the Old Ground Hotel, then wandered our way through a couple of pubs in town to raise a glass, including Knox’s Pub and Bistro for some lively trad music, finishing off at the hotel bar, Cruises.
Then suddenly it was show day. Light focus in the morning, followed by an afternoon cue-to-cue, then dinner break and show. This cue-to-cue went quickly in comparison to others, thank goodness, particularly thanks to Mike O, and Eddie and his team. It was a good show, and we were delighted that our friends from the Roisin Dubh in Galway came over to see it, including Owen’s mom as a special guest.
My “booth” was right in with the crowd so I got to see a lot of the reactions–the audience was very complimentary and gracious with their applause. Post-show, we headed back to Cruises for a few drinks and then off to bed as we were heading on to Kilkenny the next morning.
I know a lot of tours have quick one night shows where you’re in and out, but as a new thing for me it was tough to process. Not just the speed of it all with little room for delays or errors, but also not getting the chance to get to know the city or the people well. Or having the chance to do the show a little better the next night once you’ve worked out the kinks. Ennis, next time we have to stay longer!
Photos taken by Maboud Ebrahimzadeh and Brianna McCoy