First, a confession: I have never read Ulysses in its entirety. As an undergraduate English major and over the following decades, I’ve perused my share of excerpts and essays, familiarizing myself with the characters and themes, the enduring resonance and influence of James Joyce’s magnum opus. But I’ve never actually sat down and tackled the beast from start to finish.
In contrast, Aedín Moloney, the co-creator and star of Yes! Reflections of Molly Bloom, first read Joyce’s novel—so dense and challenging that whole college courses are dedicated to it—at ten years old, as her bio in the program informs us. This inspired a “lifelong fascination” with the writer, the work and particularly Ms. Bloom, the character who narrates the final episode of Ulysses. Yes!, now in its second engagement at Irish Repertory Theatre, is a one-act adaptation of that soliloquy, for which Moloney partnered with noted author Colum McCann.
Do you need to share Moloney’s fascination, or at least have read her source material, to fully appreciate this project? I’m obviously not in the best position to say. But it helps to know this much: Until this last portion of Ulysses, Molly—whom Joyce based on Penelope in The Odyssey—is (from what I’ve gleaned) revealed to us only as others see her. Far more attention is paid to the inner lives of the two other central figures, both of them men: Leopold Bloom, Molly’s husband and the book’s quotidian Odysseus, and Stephen Dedalus, the aspiring writer modeled after Odysseus’s son Telemachus, as well as Joyce himself.
Thus Molly’s reflections in the novel suggests an almost frenzied sense of release; the chapter includes what was until quite recently credited as the longest sentence ever written, running well over four thousand words—without punctuation. Finally given a voice, this gal appears to hold nothing back; her appetites, her regrets, her frustrations—with men, most notably (and her husband particularly), and the expectations and restrictions placed on her own sex—come gushing forth.
It’s a tall order to bring all this to the stage, one requiring both tremendous energy and the intuition and discretion necessary to make the text accessible rather than overwhelming. Happily, Moloney has this and does this, both as a co-adaptor—McCann praises her editing skills in his program notes—and as a performer; and under John Keating’s similarly disciplined, robust direction, Yes! makes for an engaging, and intense, ninety minutes.
The action—or talk, more accurately—takes place entirely in what seems to be a bare room, though Charlie Corcoran’s subtle scenic design provides certain objects required in the script. Moloney is costumed, by Leon Dobkowski, in a simple and rather flimsy white dress, accompanied by a wheat-colored shawl that, as she wears it—or doesn’t—suggests only a flicker of modesty. By this point in Joyce’s story, Molly’s husband has established her as a lusty creature, to put it gently, and the corporeal preoccupations and longings expressed here, in strikingly frank terms—whether the subject is a love affair or menstrual suffering—don’t contradict that picture.
But Molly wouldn’t be a feminist icon (for many) a century after Ulysses was first published if she could be defined simply by her confessions of infidelity or her bawdy wit. Her testimony defies reductive interpretations and underlines double standards, as Moloney and McCann repeatedly remind us through passages that both lament men’s assorted weaknesses—”They haven’t half the character a woman has,” Molly declares at one point—and acknowledge their centrality in women’s lives, or in this woman’s, at least.
“A woman wants to be embraced 20 times a day almost to make her look young,” Molly wryly concedes, while detailing a fantasy involving the younger Stephen. In other moments, such as when she’s remembering the infant son she lost years ago, she is achingly vulnerable. Moloney’s deeply committed, richly nuanced performance ensures that the character’s passions and contradictions are palpable and compelling throughout.
It’s no doubt an exhausting job for a single actor, and I left the theater feeling even more embarrassed that I hadn’t yet managed the less Herculean task of completing a certain novel, which is now on my summer reading list—again. Should I meet my goal this time, I’ll be sure to send Moloney a thank-you note.
