The Irish Repertory Theatre returns to its roots with Sean O’Casey’s perfect fusion of realism and poetry, of somber tragedy and extravagant comedy jostling one another in his 1924 Dublin masterpiece, Juno and the Paycock.

Juno and the Paycock is an extravagant portrait of the poetically comic and tragic world of a Dublin torn apart by the chaos of the Irish Civil War. The gestures of life are often broad, and the speech torrential as Jack Boyle and sidekick Joxer Daly's drinking and posturing rise to comic heights. When the news of an unexpected inheritance arrives, the family sees a flame of hope as the heroic Juno Boyle dreams of taking war-crippled son, Johnny, and his sister, young Mary, out of their squalid surroundings into a better life. However, hopes are dashed and reality returns as a twist of fate brings their dreams crashing down around them.