"I MUST be a glutton for punishment" chuckles director Matthew McElhinney of his latest challenge – a revamped production of his mother Marie Jones's Olivier-winning play Stones In His Pockets, which brings the movie at the centre of the story to life via a 'trailer' packed with pre-recorded star cameos.
Audiences can expect to see familiar faces like Adrian Dunbar, Kerri Quinn, Saoirse Monica Jackson, Siobhán McSweeney, Tara Lynne O'Neill and Tommy Tiernan, as well as turns from original Stones star Conleth Hill and original Stones In His Pockets director (and Matthew McElhinney's father) Ian McElhinney – plus a couple more 'big name' surprises.
"Stones is a hard enough play to direct in and of itself, but then when you're talking about adding this whole technical element to it as well, so much more time and effort has to go into just getting that right," he says of the new 25th anniversary update of the tragicomedy hit.
Marie Jones's witty, emotionally resonant two-hander was inspired by her experiences working as an extra on the Hollywood productions which flocked to Ireland in the 1990s in order to take advantage of lucrative tax breaks.
The play centres on a fictional US production which commandeers a rural Irish town during the making of a typically Americanised historical 'Oirish' epic. When a tragedy strikes the community to the apparent indifference of the Hollywood intruders, local extras Jake and Charlie are inspired to make their own more authentic movie based on their less than stellar experiences with Tinseltown.
Starring Gerard McCabe and Shaun Blaney, the 25th anniversary production of Stones in His Pockets opened to critical acclaim last year at the Barn Theatre in Cirencester, England, where audiences got their first taste of what McElhinney jokingly describes as "Stones on steroids".
"This is going to be a much sharper and slicker version," he tells me of what audiences will be able to see at the Lyric theatre in Belfast next week, where the production is currently hard at work in rehearsals.
"Last time we did have a great run, but I always feel like there's another gear to go. We've a bigger stage in here so we've re-vamped the set somewhat to accommodate that and the AV screen designs have changed too.
"It also gives me time to really dig down into the detail with the actors. Last time around there was so much concentration on the fact that there was a 'movie' going into the end of the play that our focus was kind of divided.
"This time it's been great because we've really been able to do all the detail work with the two actors."
Indeed, it seems the Stones team were a long way from resting on their laurels as they geared up for the play's home run.
"My mum and I watched the production video from our last run to see how what the lads were saying matched up to the actual script," reveals McElhinney of the team's starting point for their Lyric transfer.
"She said to me, 'There's a hell of a lot of f***in' paraphrasing going on here'. Then the two of us sat and went through it with a fine-tooth comb. We're happy that it's word perfect – now the lads just have to say it."
Happily, McElhinney has full confidence in his leading men, both of whom he already knew well before they were cast.
"Gerard actually produced A Night In November," the director explains, "and I've worked with Shaun loads on stage as an actor as well as directing him.
"In fact, Shaun has just been nominated for Best Actor in the Irish Times Irish Theatre Awards [for the Gerry Conlon bioplay In The Name of The Son]. That will have grown him as a performer, and Gerard just has naturally funny bones – but the discipline of the comedy is starting to sink in for both of them during these rehearsals."
The director also has his work cut out for him in making sure that the 25th anniversary production stays on course, as he explains.
"There's a lot of challenges with this play," McElhinney tells me.
"One of the hardest things is balancing the comedy with the pathos. Because when it's funny it's hilarious, but there's also a punch in the guts every now and then.
"It's a tragicomedy with a tragedy at the centre of it, hence the title: the young lad from the local community kills himself. So it's all about trying to get that balance just right and making sure the tragedy really lands while also being funny and entertaining."
Tellingly, one of the main reasons that Marie Jones was keen to 'reclaim' her 1996 play for its 25th anniversary was the fact that, over the years, the delicate balance of comedy and drama within the piece had begun to skew too far towards funny.
"It felt like it was almost becoming a parody of itself," explains McElhinney, who successfully helmed an update of another Marie Jones hit, the football-themed one-hander A Night In November, which played to rave reviews at the MAC last year with Matt Forsythe as its star (McElhinney, who also acts, took the lead for one well-received performance).
"It's actually like life imitating art: in the exact same way that the film in the play becomes 'Irish with a capital O', that's what productions of Stones were becoming. It was almost getting like 'Carry On up the Stones', so we're trying to bring it back to what it's meant to be, albeit with all new packaging."
As mentioned, that 'new packaging' involves inserting a pre-recorded movie trailer into the play – but fans who remember the more bare-bones staging of Stones's original run, which travelled from Féile an Phobail to the Edinburgh Fringe, to London's West End and onward to a Tony-nominated Broadway run, can rest assured that the extra elements in the new production serve the storytelling at its core.
"The magic of the first one was that it was so lean and mean, just two guys and a flight case," admits McElhinney, who will star alongside Matt Forsythe in Lockdown DLA, the sequel to Stephen Large's 2019 hit Dog DLA Afternoon which will open at the MAC in September, "but this one is kind of 'Stones on steroids'.
"We've definitely elevated the play to a level of real spectacle which it hasn't had before. That's what we were aiming for – but the main thing is still the story and the two lads' ability to tell it. Everything after that is bells and whistles."
He adds: "Basically, it's the exact same play just with a couple of nips and tucks and inserts to bring this new concept to it."
Getting the celebrity cameos together for the play has been a mission in itself, as McElhinney explains: "On my non-existent days off, I basically have to drive around the country filming famous people.
"It was great to get some of the Derry Girls stars, not that Grandpa Joe [Ian McElhinney] had a choice, and we've another couple of very exciting cameos who we'll be filming soon which I don't think I can mention yet.
"Everyone we've approached has been very supportive, which would be typical of the acting community here. They've done it for nothing and we're so grateful to them for that."
:: Stones In His Pockets, June 7 to July 3, the Lyric theatre, Belfast. Performance times and ticket info available via lyrictheatre.co.uk
