It has an Irish tour throughout July, but it kicks off with a performance in New York this week.
We’re referring to “The Smuggler,” playwright Ronán Noone’s award-winning one-man thriller in rhymed verse.
Set on a wealthy Massachusetts island in 2025, it follows Irish immigrant Tim Finnegan, played by Michael Mellamphy, as he’s pulled into the island’s criminal underworld after a fatal crash stirs tensions between locals and migrant workers. Directed by two-time Tony Award-winning producer Conor Bagley and produced by New York entrepreneur Jessica M. DeLucia, this gripping and darkly comic tale asks: what would you do to survive—and to belong?
“The Smuggler Summer Tour 2025” begins at Ryan’s Daughter, on New York's Upper East Side on Thursday evening, followed by performances at St. John’s Theatre, Listowel, on July 11, the Cork Arts Theatre, July 16, 17, 18 and 19, the Harrison Hotel, Belfast, July 23, 24, and 25, and J.R. Mahon’s, Dublin, July 28, 29 and 30. It is presented in association with Origin Theatre Company.
“The Smuggler” was voted “Best Play” when it debuted at 1st Irish Theatre Festival in 2019, with Mellamphy performing as Finnegan, “The Smuggler” has since had numerous productions across the U.S., including a run in 2023 when the Irish Repertory Theatre produced the Off-Broadway premiere, directed by Bagley.
That production garnered rave reviews, including one where Ken Marks of the New Yorker magazine called it “a terrific, one man, one act play,” in which “Mellamphy is a dynamic presence, shifting easily among male and female roles and a variety of accents, while showing off some damn impressive cocktail-mixing moves.”
Mellamphy remarked: “It has been a dream of mine for a long time, to bring this play home to my family, friends and communities where I started out. This is a play about an Irish immigrant, facing the challenges of life in a different land. It resonates with so much of what we are talking about at this moment in time. To be able to perform this in my home is a very special opportunity”.
The U.S.-born director Bagley, who began his professional directing career at the Abbey Theatre in Dublin, said, “Ronán’s language is ferocious, mischievous, and razor-sharp—and in Mick’s hands, it becomes a high-wire act. Directing this piece has been a reminder of just how thrilling and dangerous theatre can be when one actor holds an audience in the palm of his hand.
“At a time when questions of borders, identity, and belonging dominate global conversation, bringing ‘The Smuggler’ to Ireland feels like a full-circle moment for a story that lives between two countries—not to mention a professional homecoming for me.”
