The Gigli concert

JPW King is a dynamatologist - an English purveyor of a cultish quack psychology-cum-science whose Dublin office is far from thriving; indeed his professional space is also his only domestic arrangement as he eats rough meals and sleeps in the office, occasionally receiving visits from his lover Mona and making phone calls to his 'true' love Helen. When an Irish man arrives to enlist King's services - he wants to be able to sing like the great Italian opera singer Beniamino Gigli - a symbiotic deadlock of character ensues, with each man playing his part, at times believing and then despairing of ever achieving any goal, whether practical or fantastic. An astonishing story of human intention and achievement, 'The Gigli concert' was first performed at the Abbey Theatre, Dublin, in 1983.