THE Gallaghers live in east Belfast. It’s 1966. Mary is heavily pregnant, Vincent is heavily into his revolutionary novel based on the Easter Rising but they are not happy bunnies.
There’s an undercurrent in the neighbourhood about a Catholic writer championing ‘the cause’ in a mainly Protestant area; there might be repercussions. But he won’t be dissuaded and the postman backs him – but then he’s in love with Mary’s sister, although he’s from ‘the other side’.
“You mean you’re a ghost?” she asks.
Typical of Rosemary Jenkinson and her way of mixing it all up to give a thought-provoking evening’s entertainment.
In the second act, we move to current day, May 2016, same house in east Belfast but 50 years on. The couple who have just moved in don’t know anything about Vincent Gallagher until the man from the Ulster Historical Society arrives to tell them there’s a Blue Plaque being put up on Thursday.
They aren’t too keen, the past is the past as far as they are concerned, but then Donna the minister of culture arrives – she reminds us of someone not a million miles away – to try to make them see sense and embrace their identity.
Some lovely cameos, Thomas Finnegan as the postman, then Dean in 2016, Kerri Quinn as Donna and Niall Cusack as Boyd of the Blue Badge. Sound performances from all, Michael Condron, Susan Davey and the others.
Once this production plays a few more times I imagine it will tighten up and it will be better for it but it pleased the audience, plenty of laughs, moments of tension and a novel book at how the past comes back to bite us on the ar** – the postman’s words, not mine.
- At the Lyric Theatre until May 14; www.lyrictheatre.co.uk.
