Writer: Frances Kay
Director: Muireann Ahern & Louis Lovett
For this year’s Dublin Fringe Festival, Theatre Lovett brings to the Peacock Stage a wonderfully weird production with Kafka’s Doll. On entering the national theatre’s looser and often livelier downstairs space, the audience is immediately welcomed into a peculiar past. Milling around the seats the performers present a box of dolls for inspection, or showcase a monkey mask, inviting you to take a close look in the hopes that you can spot some of these things when the show starts. It’s playful, evocative, and sets a satisfying scene. The stage (charmingly set by Jamie Vartan) is equally strange, full of colour and light and mess and old timey tech; a projector to the left already rolling. The appetite is whet and the room is filled with an eagerness for the show to begin.
What follows is an hour-long tribute to a very beloved Kafka. You don’t need to be familiar with his work to enjoy this production, and the cast are quick to let you know that: while it does draw on Kafka’s stories and a real moment from his life, the rest is imagined from the delightful minds of Frances Kay and Theatre Lovett, and it remains perfectly accessible throughout. The story follows the imagined adventures of a little girl’s lost doll, and the letters that Kafka writes to that girl from Lilli the doll as she traverses the world. There is a lovely poignancy to the show, which gently mourns the shortness of Kafka’s life, who died at only 40, and wistfully notes how beautifully he was able to imagine places he never had the chance to visit.
None of the actors play specific parts, but each is a true pleasure to watch for this underground hour in 1920s Berlin. Charlotte Cleary at times plays a version of Dora Diamant (Kafka’s lover during the final year of his life), at others mimes along to the voice of Lilli, Cormac Mohally primarily plays a version of Kafka’s character Mr. Blumfled, Louis Lovett himself could be said to occasionally represent Kafka, though shines most brightly as a monkey emperor. When they aren’t playing parts in the story all three are telling the story, and they bring a deliciously camp and kitsch physical humour that is a joy to behold. So many perfectly timed gaffes and truly laugh out loud moments litter this show. Lovett also brings some very impressive circus skills to the stage – alternately unicycling, juggling, and spinning himself in a giant hoop. The feeling is that of real wonder and fun, a show that is dazzling and silly enough for children, with tones and themes dark enough to give you pause.
There’s so much to be immersed in – the sound (designed by Carl Kennedy, but with composition and lyrics from Nico Brown) is so engaging and changeable, setting and moving the story and transitions, with help from the splendid light design from Sarah Jane Shiels, who utilises colour and spots and darkness to great success. Lilli’s adventures appear concurrently in little dioramas and on the projector screen, it’s gorgeous, and there are often simply too many things happening on the stage to take in at once. An hour passes in twenty minutes. The tiny dolls are designed and made by Alisa Iakimanskaia; they are just the right amount of creepy. An absolute hit and a perfect way to escape reality for a moment this September.
Runs Until 12th Sept 2026.
