London, England

THE VEIL: Conor McPherson's The Seafarer has had more than two dozen stagings in the U.S. since its debut at London's National Theatre in 2006 and that production's subsequent Broadway transfer. It's not hard to see why the play has such wide appeal: Its stakes could not be higher, since McPherson chose to seat the Devil himself at the poker table. Much of the Irish playwright's work (The Weir, Shining City) has generated electricity from supernatural goings-on, whether seen onstage or simply discussed in conspiratorial tones. His latest, The Veil, crackles with that same eerie energy.

The Veil, which premieres at the National this month, is McPherson's first show set in an era other than his own. He says that visions of the play, including its 1822 mise-en-scène at a once-prosperous rural estate, came to him a decade ago. He was daunted, initially, by the research a period piece requires, but the idea persisted. "What continually drew me back was its potential sense of atmosphere," McPherson recalls. He realized that a setting with "no electric light—and a stronger pervading sense of superstition than perhaps we have now"—could only enhance the ghostly mood.

As director of the National's production, McPherson gets to craft that spooky-old-mansion vibe along with designers Rae Smith and Neil Austin, who also did the set and lights, respectively, for The Seafarer's premiere. "Light and shade is everything in a play," remarks McPherson, adding, "We all instinctively know that when a show really works, it should feel like a collective dream." Jim Norton—who won Olivier and Tony awards for his portrayal of the blind alcoholic Richard in The Seafarer—will originate the role of The Veil's defrocked Anglican minister, Reverend Berkeley. The erstwhile clergyman has been tasked with escorting young Hannah Lambroke to her future husband's home, but he shows more interest in Hannah's disputed "gift" for hearing uncanny voices in her present abode.

The debt-ridden estate that McPherson has conjured exists some 80 years and 2,000 fictional miles apart from the doomed cherry orchard of Chekhov's final masterwork—but, in both plays, rumbling class divisions add a looming sense of instability to the lives of the mostly aristocratic main characters. When asked whether the Russian playwright is an influence, McPherson responds, "I have always enjoyed what we might call the Chekhovian genre—people gathered at the big house while the past is catching up, with all its attendant emotional fireworks." (He adds: "I don't think my work is anything as experimental as Chekhov's, but if I can engender half the sense of atmosphere he can, I'd be delighted.") Facing the past in The Veil means reaching across the line between living and dead—and while the interpretation of most events is left to the spectator, McPherson is no skeptic, at least not while he's immersed in the world of his plays. "Whenever there is a supernatural element in my work, I have no problem believing it is real," he readily admits. "I regard our existence and human consciousness as mysterious and miraculous anyway, so I have never really seen any divide between the natural and the supernatural." (Opening Sept. 27; (44) 20–7–452–3400; www.nationaltheatre.org.uk)

Dublin, Ireland

ULSTER BANK DUBLIN THEATRE FESTIVAL: Artistic director Loughlin Deegan heads his fifth and final Dublin Theatre Festival—and this fall, he becomes the first director of the Lir, the new National Academy of Dramatic Art at Trinity College Dublin. According to Irish Theatre Magazine, "If a festival takes on the personality of its director, the UBDTF under Deegan has become more conspicuously engaged with its city, its country and its culture to become something more than an editorial on the state of the artform. The scope of its program has widened, as has its taste and ambition. It has built on relationships with established and emerging Irish theatremakers to ensure that the quality of its homegrown work has nothing to apologize for."

Ten of this year's 28 offerings world premieres, including one such homegrown project which was shown in progress last year: The Blue Boy, by Brokentalkers. An indictment of institutionalized child abuse in Ireland, it is a co–production with Iceland's LóKAL Theatre Festival Reykjavík, Holland's Noorderzon Performing Arts Festival Groningen, Finland's Korjaamo Theatre/Stage Festival Helsinki and Ireland's own Cork Midsummer Festival. Also among the premieres: The Wild Bride, a bluesy adventure from Cornwall's Kneehigh Theatre (known internationally for The Red Shoes and Brief Encounter). (Sept. 29–Oct. 16; (353) 1–677–8439; www.dublintheatrefestival.com)

Tàrrega, Spain

FIRATÀRREGA: You might say a circus runs through it—acrobatics abound in the offerings in Catalonia's street theatre festival. Opening event Entròpic, by Los Galindos, is set on, around and above a catwalk more than 40 yards long. Musical theatre and circus mix in the self–titled performance by Call Me María, which sets its rock-and-roll antics in a 1950s Barcelona soccer bar. Circus and dance mesh in a nightmarish adaptation of Rainer Werner Fassbinder's play and film The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant by Cia. de Dansa Sol Picó. Cia. Es promises a convergence of "circus feats and the spontaneity of street theatre" in Déjàsenti, which shuffles around societal roles in the manner of a tangram puzzle. Clowns star in Cia. La Industrial Teatrera's De paso. And street theatre skews serious in La Patriótico Interesante of Chile's Kadogo, niño soldado, about child soldiers. Even in Kadogo, there is the air of a brutal circus about the performance, with the burned-out shell of a vehicle like a twisted stand-in for a clown car, and a ring of fire corraling gang recruits instead of lions. (Sept. 8–11; (34) 973–310–854; www.firatarrega.cat)