HARD TIMES
Scott says the play about his mother covers a period of social history that many can learn from. Falling pregnant after a chance encounter with his father, his mother went on to give birth to six children at a time when Irish women weren’t allowed (by the Catholic church) to control their fertility. She used toilet paper as contraception before the arrival of the birth control pill. Joan raised six children on barely anything, and went to work in a factory in the mid-1960s, an era when – her son says – the status of a working mother wasn’t much better than a prostitute.
Scott was in Year 11 when his mother announced she would start her factory job. “Five kids were still at home and Dad was drinking heavily. Mum told us she didn’t have enough money for knickers. I remember the absolute horror of it. We pleaded with her not to work. Women didn’t work back then.’’
But determined to become independent of her husband and support her family, Joan secured her own income and was able to buy a Hoovermatic washing machine – something we take for granted today – which made her life a bit easier.
Generally, though, life was hard, and Joan went from being a confident, glamorous, optimistic young woman to a cynical, bitter one. When reflecting on his mother and her difficult life, Scott sums it up by saying “Mum worked like crazy.’’
Subtitling his play “A play about a wonderful mum by an ungrateful son”, he says: “I think she felt robbed. We take so much for granted now, but Mum’s situation reminds us of the gains that women have made over time.’’