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ONE OF the definite highlights of this year’s Galway Arts Festival sees the welcome reunion of playwright Tom Murphy with Druid Theatre for a new production of his great play The Gigli Concert, directed by Garry Hynes.

Druid is planning a special evening to celebrate the opening of its newly refurbished theatre at Chapel Lane on Friday July 17.

It is exactly 30 years since Thos McDonogh and Sons presented Druid Theatre, for a peppercorn rent, with an old warehouse in Chapel Lane, in Galway’s Latin Quarter. It was far from a Latin Quarter at the time. Like other parts of the old city most of it was falling apart. Old 18th and 19th century buildings were roofless and derelict, a home for cats and rats. But it had a rough diamond look about it too with its pawnbrokers, ‘Nora Crubs’, the always warm Tigh Neachtain’s (if you could get in!), the Pedler and Kenny bookshops, Sonny Molloy’s very modest women’s undergarments shop, and the larger than life Mrs Mc Donagh, who showed us all that there was more to the fish industry than a stinky grilled herring, fried mackerel, and the auld cod.

DRUID HAVE only recently completed their acclaimed run of Tom Murphy’s The Gigli Concert but the company are not resting on their laurels.

With three of Ireland’s top theatre companies making their way to Longford this season, Backstage Theatre is offering audiences a €10 discount per ticket when they book to see all three productions.

Druid has this week won two awards at the Manchester Evening News Theatre Awards, rounding off an incredible 2009 for the Galway theatre company.