Beauty Queen stands the test of time in Druid’s new production

Review by Judy Murphy

There’s a school of thought that says you should “never go back” to events or people from your past. And there’s another, which disagrees.

When it comes to drama, Garry Hynes is in the latter camp. Druid’s Artistic Director has never been afraid to revisit plays which the company has previously performed, usually with considerable success.

Now, 20 years after it premiered in Galway, going on to win four Tony Awards on Broadway, Druid has returned to Martin McDonagh’s The Beauty Queen of Leenane.

The play divided audiences when it was first staged here in February, 1996. Many loved it, while others detested the faux Connemara dialect of McDonagh’s characters. Two decades on, though, its central theme – the tormented relationship between 40-year-old Maureen Folan and her manipulative 70-year-old mother Mag – has stood the test of time.

Maureen is a single woman, caring for Mag in their isolated Leenane cottage.  Their domestic routine involves Mag rocking on her chair as she issues orders to Maureen about Complan, porridge, biscuits, tea and turf. The long-suffering Maureen is deeply angry and resentful that her life has been sacrificed to care for this relentlessly demanding and thankless woman.

Maureen finds a chance of happiness, courtesy of local man, Pato Dooley who is home from London for a brief visit. Suspense builds as it seems Maureen can finally grab a chance to really live.

Beauty Queen is savagely funny and it’s savage – so the chances of a happy ending are slim. But we hope. Taking us on that journey in this production is the wonderful mother-daughter pairing of Marie Mullen and Aisling O’Sullivan.  Marty Rea plays Pato, and Aaron Monaghan his tearaway younger brother, the messenger-boy, Ray, who muses over making his getaway to the bright lights of London  . . . or maybe Manchester because it has more drugs!

The play is set in the early 1990s, a time when Australian soaps reigned on RTÉ and communication methods were far more primitive than today.

The action in Beauty Queen rarely moves from the confines of the Folans’ kitchen, but the bleakness outside is brought home via the pelting rain of the opening scene, courtesy of Francis O’Connor’s magnificent set, as well as by references to the rough, mucky road to the house.

For more, read this week’s Galway City Tribune.