Take a break from the dreary, gray weather this weekend with a trip to Ireland, circa 1936, courtesy of ISU Theatre.

The department is opening its 1996-97 season with Brian Friel’s much-lauded Dancing at Lughnasa, winner of both the Tony and Olivier Award for best play. The show starts tonight.

Dancing at Lughnasa (pronounced LOON-uh-sa) is the story of five unmarried, Catholic sisters, eking out their existence in a small Irish village. The festival of Lughnasa, a celebration of the pagan god of the harvest, is upon them, with its vivid color and dance.

Jane Cox, the play’s director and an associate professor music, said that much of the show’s messages cannot be expressed in mere words.

“This script deals with so many wonderful things,” she said. “It’s like a poem where words do not communicate everything that is there.”

Jennifer Vierck, a senior in theater studies who plays the part of Maggie, “the joker of the family,” agreed that the script makes the show and is a fitting send-off for her career with ISU Theatre.

“Because the play is an incredible script,” she said, “it makes my last show at Iowa State touching.”

Another moving part of the play is the non-verbal communication, including dance, which plays an important role in the lives of these five sisters.

“The significance of the title is a connection to that festival and also a connection to dance, which is a very strong, powerful part of the story,” Cox said. “Some of the sisters’ happiest times involve dance. Many times during the most important times of our lives, words don’t even exist; they become dance.”

Cox said that the members of the cast have put in a lot of hours to bring the community this production. Not only have they had to do the usual things for a play, like memorizing lines and constant rehearsal, but many are proficient singers and dancers.

“They have worked so hard,” Cox said. “They have to be able to dance. They have to be able to act, and several of them sing. They also spent a lot of time learning the Irish dialect. They’ve had to learn so much.”

Jason Slater, an undeclared freshman who narrates the story, said that picking up the Irish brogue was easier than he thought it would be.

“I’ve had to do English accents before but not Irish,” Slater said. “It wasn’t as difficult as I was afraid it was going to be. We ended up watching a lotta movies, like In the Name of the Father.”

Vierck agreed that watching movies and listening to dialect tapes helped immensely in absorbing the Irish accent. She said they had to get away from “the Lucky Charms guy” voice because they need a northern Irish accent, and the cereal man doesn’t have one.

Slater also mentioned the spectacular sets and background scenery that the crew put together. “Even though I know the amount of work that went into a production, I was impressed with the professionalism,” he said. “The set is extraordinary. I’ve never seen a set go up that quickly with that much detail.”

Dancing at Lughnasa is not the most well-known story, especially in comparison to some of ISU Theatre’s other upcoming productions, which Vierck hopes is not a disadvantage.

“It’s a play that people don’t know coming into it,” she said. “Maybe two percent of people who see this show have seen it before. I’m hoping that doesn’t scare people away. It’s a good show to open the season with.”

Vierck is also glad that this play will close her college theater career, just because it is so different from other shows she has done.

“Working with so many new people is different, [from] so many different majors,” she said. “The whole mood of the show is different than any other show I’ve done. It’s more dark, but at the same time, it’s not. There are those bits of humor that come in.”

Dancing at Lughnasa opens tonight at Fisher Theatre. The show also plays tomorrow night, and both Friday and Saturday nights of next weekend. Evening showtime is 7:30 p.m., with Sunday matinees at 2 p.m.

Tickets for the show are $4.75 for students, $6.75 for seniors and $7.75 for adults.

Punchcards are also available for students at $14 each. These cards allow holders four “punches” for main stage shows and two “punches” for Second Stage productions. That way, cardholders can use more than one punch for each show if they want to take a friend.