Exposing the poison within people
OF the current crop of movies doing the rounds in our cinemas, ‘The Greatest Showman’ is inspired by the legendary PT Barnum, he who coined the phrase ‘no such thing as bad publicity’ and isn’t that the truth when it comes to bums on seats?
A bit of controversy. Get them talking. Split the public down the middle and you may well launch fervour and vitriol akin to a local derby, in sporting parlance. And all the while, the turnstiles will turn, the stadiums will pack, the theatres sell out.
Another man high on the crest of the current Hollywood wave is English playwright Martin McDonagh with his screenplay for ‘Three Billboards’, a fine movie that has been scooping up several awards.
Indeed since the arrival of the first McDonagh trilogy for stage – The Beauty Queen of Lenanne, (1996), A Skull in Connemara (1997) and The Lonesome West (1997) – there is no denying that lavish praise has been heaped upon the Londoner’s work. There have been several Tony Award nominations and an Olivier Award for best New Play for his piece, Hangman. But he is not without his detractors.
Some would make a case for a major hoax having been perpetrated in the early days of the aforementioned trilogy. Commercial viability in an unabashed overdose of Paddywackery. Were these escalations in cartoonish stage Oirishness at the end of the 90s, rehashed visits to Irish work from the other end of the century?
Parallels between Synge’s Playboy from 1907 and Beauty Queen are pretty stark. (The third title, Lonesome West is actually borrowed from Playboy.) The New York Times caused quite a stir in the 90s with its liberal references to an abundance of ‘stage Irishness’. Critic John Waters remarked that to ask an Irish audience if the script mirrors or reflects themselves, would indeed be an insult. (Bit like Brendan O’Carroll and his wretched slapstick twaddle, perhaps? Howls of laughter but do not dare ask the audience if it reflects themselves!)
But, whether genius or fraud, the early work of McDonagh is certainly full of strong substance and bitter reality. Particularly in The Beauty Queen of Leenane.
The play, set in a cottage in 1990s Connemara, is essentially the tale of an aging mother and her spinster daughter and their sadistic passive-aggressive relationship as they struggle to tolerate each other. When an invite to a party affords Maureen, the daughter, one last shot at love where she encounters and later entertains Pato, a native, home from London, a witch-like battle of nastiness between both women ensues.
The more Maureen attempts to unshackle herself from Mag, the mother, the more old vulnerabilities, vengefulness and lunacy all emerge. When Pato puts pen to paper in an effort to convince Maureen that he and she do have a future together and a route to salvation, a series of shocking events derail his plans with deadly consequence. Finally, we are left with a desolate Maureen, metamorphosing into another Mag. The inevitability of our lot.
Several heavyweight topics are woven into the fabric of this play. The impact of aging parents and their vicelike grip on the next generation, fuelling a slide toward depression, anxiety and helplessness. The retrospective adoration from the immigrant and the desperate hope of the abandoned. The enormity of the consequences from our actions in life, in our treatment of one another.
Beauty Queen is, in the main, carried by comedy, good comedy, both dark and romantic varieties, but the spine and strength of the writing is the exposure of the poison within people. In short, I would conclude, it successfully rattles us, the audience, with a series of dreadful acts carried out by the awful, on the wicked, and wicked acts carried out by the dreadful, on the awful. It strikes a chord.
Enniscorthy Theatre Group, under the direction of Tom Reddy, will perform Beauty Queen for three nights this week at The Presentation Centre. Reader, get a ticket, don’t miss it!