Review: STONES IN HIS POCKETS, Barn Theatre
Photo credit: Alex Tabrizi
The twenty-fifth anniversary production of this beautifully written and conceived play sees it return to the Barn Theatre in Cirencester (where it played in 2022) after a four week stay at the Lyric Belfast (where it originally started in 1996) and before a short regional tour to the Cheltenham Everyman, Bolton Octagon (recently nominated as most welcoming theatre), and the lovely Salisbury Playhouse. It has been lovingly restaged with wonderful integrated video elements which create a succession of delightful pictures from the filming of Quiet Valley in Ireland. The writing is brilliantly theatrical, but the staging is wonderfully cinematic with the amusing appearance on screen at the end of Liam Neeson, James Nesbitt and Cian Hinds, as well as other Irish actors adding to that feel.
Writer Mary Jones has updated some lines (with references to Amazon Prime (2005) and Forty Shades of Green (2015)) to freshen it but the essence of the play is a clever combination of comical observations on the Hollywood film making process, the poignant impact on the rural community they shoot in and some heartfelt thoughts about perseverance in pursuit of dreams, which give it an emotional heart. We, in the audience, are extras too in the film and there is a sense that the script Charlie is carrying is the play we are watching whereby the extras are the stars, and the stars are the extras. They break the fourth wall to reinforce the point, and the intimacy of the 200-seat venue adds to that inclusivity.
Charlie Conlon, hilariously played by Gerard McCabe, is on the run having shut up his DVD shop and working on the script of a film he hopes to pitch at the Studio making Quiet Valley. He forms a relationship with Jake Quinn, beautifully played by Shaun Blaney, as they stand in as extras in the film during the crowd scenes. However, what gives the play its creative and innovative edge is that the two actors also play thirteen other characters and are called on to switch between them with the quickest and smallest of changes of costume and accents at great pace. They switch between the film makers, Clem (Director), Simon (1st AD), Aisling (3rd AD), John (voice coach), Caroline Giovanni (female star), Jock ( her security guard), and the locals Mickey (the oldest surviving extra from The Quiet Man), Sean Harkin (17-year-old dreamer), Fin (Sean’s friend), and Father Gerard (their old teacher). It is a tour de force performance full of energy, wonderful comic timing and clever characterisations. There are so many delightful scenes created by these two fine actors. Jake and Charlie, in the pub after shooting observing Caroline, is charming. Caroline’s seduction of Jake in her winnebago is brilliantly judged and paced. Jake and Charlie acting watching the two stars arrive in horseback while digging turfs is clever physical comedy. The two together on the pews at a funeral is a well-timed piece of comic business. To cap it all off, the Irish dancing routine is a show stopping celebration of Irish culture.
Director, Matthew McElhinney, the son of the author and the play’s original director, creates the world with an assured touch ensuring the pacing is perfect and varied from the mad cap burlesque comedy, through gentle observed behaviours to moments of sadness and poignancy. The wonderful setting by Gregor Donnelly, using flight cases and film lighting to set the scene, and enhanced by Benjamin Collins and Alex Tabrizi’s marvellous video projections make for a vibrant backdrop and creates a real sense of location without slowing the pace. The costume changes are simple and highly effective with a change of cap, braces or jacket all that is required to switch character and a neck tie brilliantly used as a Mickey’s walking stick.
A character says “people don’t go to the cinema to get depressed, that is what the theatre is for” but this could not be further from the truth with this play. This is theatre at its very best and most entertaining . A comic delight. A masterclass in character acting. A joyous celebration of Irish rural culture. An uplifting evening of fun that calls on us to never give up on our dreams. What’s more, it highlights what a marvel the Built by the Barn producers are, passed over by the Arts Council of England as a National Portfolio Organisation but demonstrating what their ‘Lets Create’ strategy should really be about; staging first class productions that engage and entertain and draw more people into the theatre. Rarely do we go to the theatre and think as we leave, we would like to see that again soon. It was one of those nights.
***** Five stars
Reviewed by: Nick Wayne
Stones in his Pockets plays at the Barn Theatre until 14 September, with further info here.