True Repertory Theatre adds matinee performance of Ellen’s Boys, Saturday, November 18, 2pm at the Irish Cultural Centre in Canton, MA. 

 

DATELINE: CANTON, MA

 

Local audiences will have an additional opportunity to travel back in time for a uniquely Irish experience – life in Dorchester, 1965, as True Repertory Theatre had added a matinee performance of Ellen’s Boys on Saturday, November 18 at 2pm. The play will take place at the Irish Cultural Centre, 200 New Boston Drive, Canton, MA. 

 

Tickets are $25 general admission, $20 ICC members, $30 at the door.  Tickets can also be purchased online on the Irish Cultural Centre website at www.irishculture.org.

 

Written by Braintree, MA playwright Jim Sullivan, Ellen’s Boys focuses on the Flaherty family, living in their Dorchester triple decker, in 1965. Ellen, a widow who has raised six children on her own, must learn to accept the changing times and her aging children’s embrace of the future.  Her middle son, Gil, now in his thirties, still lives at home and struggles to come to terms with his sexuality in the face of his staunch Irish Catholic upbringing, as his mother attempts to marry him off.  We follow the Flaherty family through a tumultuous year of upheaval in which no secrets are safe, no boundaries are respected, and only their love for one another, and their sense of humor, can save them. 

 

“We are thrilled to bring an additional performance of Ellen’s Boys—the two evening performances on Friday, November 17 and Saturday, November 18 sold out very quickly,” said Artistic Director Donald Sheehan, who plays Gil in the True Rep production.  

 

“Anyone with Irish relations or friends will recognize this family,” says Victoria Bond, who plays Ellen.  “They act out of love and are beautifully imperfect and impossibly strong.”  

 

Paul Noonan, Artistic Advisor at True Rep, who plays the eldest son, John, adds, “Audiences can’t help but root for the Flaherty family – just as we are rooting for this play.”  

 

The playwright, James Sullivan, who has been writing plays for 30 years, says, “I am humbled by the work True Rep is putting into my play, and thrilled by the level of talent they bring to this production. Having Ellen’s Boys play at the Irish Cultural Centre is a thrill and an honor.”