Derry good show proves Lisa’s talents
What made Lisa McGee’s Derry Girls so successful was the juxtaposition of childhood innocence with the graphic violence prevalent throughout the city.
The laugh-out-loud moments were pressed right up alongside tragic happenings, highlighting both even more explicitly.
It’s a tool she uses impeccably, equally so in Girls & Dolls, a stunning exploration of friendship and memory.
It stars Jamie Lee O’Donnell, who served McGee’s work so well in Derry Girls, alongside Jennifer Barry from The Young Offenders. They play Emma and Clare, who meet in a fight over a swing at the park and become firm friends.
The story starts in voiceover, with the two, now grown women, looking back at their childhood.
They’re trying to recall stories but as they speak, their lines running into each other, little details get lost or muddled up.
The main thrust of their recollections are, however, sound.
The dialogue is complex and colloquial but so rhythmic that it’s almost like the two are playing instruments as they weave their memories together.
They play a range of characters simply by changing their voices and stance: the grumpy shop owner, the chain-smoking sisters who live across the road and pay the girls to go shopping for them, a neighbour burned while trying to save his wife from a fire and the glamorous woman who moves into number 14 with her baby daughter.
As soon as the latter enters the equation, you can immediately feel that she’s at the heart of whatever it is that went wrong between the two girls.
The majority of the laughs come from basic human observation — the cliches rolled out by adults to children and the innocence of youth to believe them.
Nostalgia reigns also each time the TV flickers on, featuring clips from The A-Team and The Dukes of Hazzard, as well as long-forgotten ads such as those for Cadbury’s Flake and Bisto. But underlying this giddiness and camaraderie is the sense that something went badly wrong for the two girls.
There are hints at an abusive relationship between Clare and her father, and she seems more prone to spontaneous violence than Emma. I can’t tell you too much more without introducing spoilers but suffice to say the story takes a very dark turn, leaving the audience enthralled and horrified.
Jamie and Jennifer are impeccable in their roles. The script is crammed and totally reliant on timing and they deliver it flawlessly.
McGee’s ability to shine a light into the darkest recesses of humanity is second to none and she has emerged as a supremely talented voice.
Girls & Dolls was written many years before Derry Girls but with both scripts she portrays wonderful characters in the most ordinary of ways.
This is a truly sublime work.