Finborough Theatre Archives - Page 9 of 27

On McQuillan’s Hill

Finborough Theatre

Reviewed – 6th February 2020

★★★★

“all credit to the Finborough for once again recovering a work of such significance”

A pulsating rhythm and elegant lyricism pervade the English premiere of the unsettling and darkly comic “On McQuillan’s Hill” at the Finborough Theatre.

It causes a double-take because the content of Joseph Crilly’s 2000 play is far from calm and tranquil – indeed, the politics and passion behind its Northern Ireland setting would make one expect something more explosive.

But in this well-observed work everything is far more subtle, with tension simmering beneath the surface as six characters meet in an isolated community hall in rural Ulster after an IRA prisoner is released under the Good Friday agreement. It’s a drama where the shadow of sectarian violence somehow sits comfortably alongside news of a farmer who has grown a record-breaking cucumber.

The play was first performed at the Lyric Theatre, Belfast, 20 years ago and it is unbelievable that such a truthful, ravishing and sometimes savage drama should have taken so long to cross the Irish Sea. So all credit to the Finborough for once again recovering a work of such significance.

An essentially uneasy domestic melodrama focussing on the Maline family slices into deeper themes of the bitter aftermath of the Troubles, malignant family history, sexuality, incest, guilt, betrayal and the legacy of ultimately futile conflict.

It’s an astonishing blend of brutality and beauty and while London may not fully comprehend the boldness and courage of that original Belfast production it’s hard to miss a rumbling contemporary resonance even as hard borders and political impasse hit the headlines.

Every character is distinctively painted in the text but director Jonathan Harden and an exemplary cast explore even greater depths to the always three dimensional roles. Behind the near mythical ambience there lie utterly credible characters. These are never less than real people with genuine lives and backgrounds.

At its heart are members of a dysfunctional family who in another world would be the subjects of a soap opera. Johnny Vivash is terrifically grizzled as the less than successful terrorist Fra Maline, a closet homosexual keen to find out why he was betrayed by former colleagues and more interested in rekindling a relationship with his ill-suited yet loyal lover Dessie (an edgy Kevin Murphy) than with his sister.

It is his sister Loretta (an emotionally charged Gina Costigan) who has bought the hall intending to convert it, but her reappearance after 20 years lifts the lid off a tureen of dark family secrets, including the long-questioned parentage of daughter Theresa (a charming and fiery Julie Maguire).

Into the mix comes the ex IRA commander Ray (a stirring and passionate Declan Rodgers)whose personal life trumps political ideology, while hovering in the background is formidable hall caretaker Mrs Tymelly (a quietly forceful Helena Bereen, who was in the original 2000 production).

Harden comprehends the unlikely humour and harsh undercurrents of this story, allowing the honesty of both story and performances to take centre stage.

The set (Norman Coates) is every inch the community hub of the past, destined to be pulled down, testimony to a discomforting past, with dimming bulbs and the detritus of past celebrations. A sombre portrait of Irish nationalist leader Robert Emmet gazes down from the wall, a reminder of past hopes and lost causes.

“On McQuillan’s Hill” still has the capacity to shock but this quality revival never loses sight of the human stories, a knowing sense of humour, and the beating heart of a nation seeking a new chapter in a troubled history.

Reviewed by David Guest

Photography by Bronwen Sharp

On McQuillan’s Hill

Finborough Theatre until 29th February

Last ten shows reviewed at this venue:

Beast on the Moon | ★★★★★ | January 2019

Time Is Love | ★★★½ | January 2019

A Lesson From Aloes | ★★★★★ | March 2019

Maggie May | ★★★★ | March 2019

Blueprint Medea | ★★★ | May 2019

After Dark; Or, A Drama Of London Life | ★★★★ | June 2019

Go Bang Your Tambourine | ★★★★ | August 2019

The Niceties | ★★★ | October 2019

Chemistry | ★★★ | November 2019

Scrounger | ★★★★ | January 2020

Click here to see our most recent reviews

Scrounger

Finborough Theatre

Reviewed – 10th January 2020

★★★★

“a great example of a play that does not appeal to our human desire for resolution, but instead rightly demonstrates that the fight for true equality and justice is far from over”

Directed by Lily McLeish, Scrounger is an autobiographical play that recounts a traumatic incident experienced by Athena Stevens at London City Airport in 2015. Born with athetoid cerebral palsy, Stevens was removed from a British Airways flight when staff could not get her £30,000 electric wheelchair into the hold. When Stevens’ chair was returned to her, it was severely damaged, leaving her without autonomous mobility and trapped in her flat for months before she received settlement.

Through Twitter hashtags, an appeal to EU law, and a petition organised by campaign group 38 Degrees, Stevens boldly embarks on trying to a change a system that is inherently stacked against her.

Stevens however does not only point blame at our Conservative government, but also the show’s presumed audience, specifically, “the left leaning, Guardian reading, Daily Mail hating, Oxfam giving, colour blind seeing, red voting, paper straw using, conflict avoiding, zen loving, feminist supporting, always for the few…liberal minded you.” The villains of this story are not just the incompetent staff she had encountered, but Stevens’ yoga-loving boyfriend and obtusely middle-class friend Emma as well, all of whom are played excellently by Leigh Quinn.

A central theme of the play is conflict and the inherent privilege of being able to avoid it. Stevens notes that amongst her friends she is known as always being ‘up for a fight’ but explains that her very existence as a disabled individual necessitates this. The faith that Stevens’ boyfriend has in the legal system to deliver justice highlights this well and succeeds in making the audience consider how they too may just be another cog in the flawed machine.

The production is split into some-twenty chapters titled with an exciting summation of the contents of the coming scenes though what follows sometimes only lasts a couple of minutes. Simultaneously, when the chapters reach double figures, there is little plot to show for it. There would certainly be great benefit to the performance’s pace in amalgamating a few chapters.

There is also little to no sense of how much real time has passed until Quinn suddenly announces halfway through the show that it has been 35 days since the incident. Based on the events that have unfolded by this point, the audience would be safe to assume it had been less than a week. Signposting the days more clearly, and perhaps even replacing the chapter titles with the day count, would certainly help to reduce moments where the play feels stagnant.

A wonky white house set (Anna Reid) surrounds the stage with two respective doors and neon-framed windows for entrance, exit and pop-ups. When she’s not playing a plethora of different characters, Quinn sits at a desk to the front right of the stage from which she accesses several props, a soundboard and a microphone. The sound (Julian Starr) and lighting (Anthony Doran) does well to match the mood on stage, though some of the production’s most powerful moments occur when everything is stripped back and Stevens addresses the audience without the glitz and glamour of the theatre.

Scrounger offers an important narrative about oppression and non-linear progression. Crucially, Stevens’ story does not end in rainbows and sunshine with everything tied up in a little bow. There is no great monetary victory; no law created to protect those vulnerable to similar mistreatment; and no real consequences for the companies involved. Scrounger is a great example of a play that does not appeal to our human desire for resolution, but instead rightly demonstrates that the fight for true equality and justice is far from over.

Finborough Theatre

Reviewed – 6th February 2020

★★★★

“all credit to the Finborough for once again recovering a work of such significance”

A pulsating rhythm and elegant lyricism pervade the English premiere of the unsettling and darkly comic “On McQuillan’s Hill” at the Finborough Theatre.

It causes a double-take because the content of Joseph Crilly’s 2000 play is far from calm and tranquil – indeed, the politics and passion behind its Northern Ireland setting would make one expect something more explosive.

The play was first performed at the Lyric Theatre, Belfast, 20 years ago and it is unbelievable that such a truthful, ravishing and sometimes savage drama should have taken so long to cross the Irish Sea. So all credit to the Finborough for once again recovering a work of such significance.

An essentially uneasy domestic melodrama focussing on the Maline family slices into deeper themes of the bitter aftermath of the Troubles, malignant family history, sexuality, incest, guilt, betrayal and the legacy of ultimately futile conflict.

It’s an astonishing blend of brutality and beauty and while London may not fully comprehend the boldness and courage of that original Belfast production it’s hard to miss a rumbling contemporary resonance even as hard borders and political impasse hit the headlines.

It is his sister Loretta (an emotionally charged Gina Costigan) who has bought the hall intending to convert it, but her reappearance after 20 years lifts the lid off a tureen of dark family secrets, including the long-questioned parentage of daughter Theresa (a charming and fiery Julie Maguire).

Into the mix comes the ex IRA commander Ray (a stirring and passionate Declan Rodgers)whose personal life trumps political ideology, while hovering in the background is formidable hall caretaker Mrs Tymelly (a quietly forceful Helena Bereen, who was in the original 2000 production).

Harden comprehends the unlikely humour and harsh undercurrents of this story, allowing the honesty of both story and performances to take centre stage.

“On McQuillan’s Hill” still has the capacity to shock but this quality revival never loses sight of the human stories, a knowing sense of humour, and the beating heart of a nation seeking a new chapter in a troubled history.

Reviewed by David Guest

Photography by Bronwen Sharp

On McQuillan’s Hill

Finborough Theatre until 29th February

Last ten shows reviewed at this venue:

Finborough Theatre

Reviewed – 10th January 2020

★★★★

“a great example of a play that does not appeal to our human desire for resolution, but instead rightly demonstrates that the fight for true equality and justice is far from over”

Through Twitter hashtags, an appeal to EU law, and a petition organised by campaign group 38 Degrees, Stevens boldly embarks on trying to a change a system that is inherently stacked against her.

Reviewed by Flora Doble

Photography by Lily McLeish

Scrounger

Finborough Theatre until 1st February

Previously reviewed at this venue:

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