ABOUT MADHOUSE

In February 2000 Mike got an invitation from Magacs Laszlo, a hungarian director at the Merlin International Theatre in Budapest, Hungary, to put on a play called The Complete Works of William Shakespeare.

Mike, who already had very close links with the theatre and who, together with Matt, had performed in several productions there, contacted Jon and Matt and the three of them began rehearsals. Little did they know at the time that this would be the start of a major venture that would take them all round Europe,

The play was an instant hit and sold out for all nine of its original performances. Later on that year they performed the opening Romeo and Juliet scene as part of the celebrations for the Merlins 10th anniversary and started to appear in more and more productions at the Merlin. The boys quickly fell in love with the city of Budapest and when asked by the then artistic director of the Merlin, Jordan Tamas, if they wanted to become a permanent fixture, jumped at the chance. Thus it was that in September 2001 Madhouse was born.


They revived The Complete Works and opened a new production - Frank McGuiness' Someone Who'll Watch Me - a haunting account of three political prisoners held in Lebanon. They did a week long launch of both shows in September and then continued to play them every month.


Not content with just the two plays they opened Spinach n' Chips in March 2002, a play by hungarian playwright Egressy Zoltan and translated by Mike. The play, directed by Fekete Peter, was a great success and ran for a year and a half at the Merlin and was even performed in London at the New End Theatre in Hampstead.

The following month Madhouse joined forces with a brilliant young Hungarian group called Atlantis and produced an English language version of their smash-hit play about the Oedipus tragedy. The play was called Two Blind Mice and ran for two years at the Merlin to full houses and was also performed at the Pecs Festival in the summer of 2002.
In December 2002 Madhouse added a fifth play to their repertoire when, again in partnership with Complete Works director Magacs, they produced the play Stones in his Pockets by Marie Jones.


Hollywood comes to a small Irish village and its impact on the local community is both hilarious and tragic. Two actors play all fifteen characters from the star actress to the disenchanted young farmer boy once entranced by the prospect of 'getting into the movies'.

Three into two doesn't go so the actors have worked out a rotation system and the aim is for them all to eventually know both parts inside out. This will give them a flexibility to mix and match as required, a flexibility they treasure given that they also spend some of their time on the set of Hollywood movies preparing for cameo roles with the likes of John Cusack, Glenn Close and Eddie Murphy. Assorted commercials have also proved to be a welcome bonus and help keep the sliced white on the table.f

Their proudest moment by far was helping Matt Ryder, of the United Nations, bring the youth of both Serb and Albanian communities under the one roof for the first time in years when in September of 2003 they performed the Complete Works in Mitrovica, Kosovo. Such was the success of this project that several further trips are being planned to add to the two already made. As well as Kosovo, they have been to Krakow (twice), Ireland (twice), London and are now regular visitors to most of the major cities in Croatia, including Zagreb.

They have recently been asked to do a National tour of Ireland in the summer and have invitations from Berlin, Moscow and Los Angeles to fulfill. As well as all this they are planning two new productions in the early part of 2004.
The boys are eternally grateful to Jordan Tamas, Laszlo Magacs and all of the staff at the Merlin for enabling them to become the first ever International theatre group based in Hungary.

The Complete Works has now been performed over 90 times, more than any foreign language play has ever been played in Hungary, and continues to be sold out a month in advance.


Most of all though the boys are grateful to the people of Budapest who continue to support them and who continue to make them feel so at home. They plan to be here for a little while lomger yet!

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