ONCE UPON A TIME...

BEN  GASTON, director, introduces The Pillowman

“Sometimes you don’t even know what you’ve been craving until the real thing comes along”  (New York Times)

I don’t know anybody who doesn’t enjoy a good story. One of life’s great pleasures is settling down with a nice hot drink, a good book and immersing oneself in the wonders of fiction.

Listening to stories as a child was wonderful.  Do you remember Listen with Mother or Jackanory?  The simplicity was spell-binding and the story-tellers did just enough to enable our imaginations to do the rest.

Fairy tales always held the most magical quality. Their mix of heroes and villains, princesses and wicked queens is perfect for the imagination of small children. At the same time it is surprising how dark these tales are. Remember the troll under the bridge, or cruel Rumpelstiltskin? There is even a Grimm’s fairy tale called The Story of the Youth Who Went Forth To Learn What Fear Was, a horrific tale involving children alone in dark castles, dead bodies, children stabbing animals and nine pin bowling using dismembered body parts. If you think I’m reading that to my five year old daughter to get her to sleep you’re mistaken.

The dark, fantastical nature of these stories is a source of inspiration for Martin McDonagh’s The Pillowman.  In an unknown totalitarian state the writer of (some pretty dark) short stories is interrogated about their gruesome content and their similarities to a number of child murders that are happening in his town. That’s all that I am going to tell you about the plot of this play, to say any more would be to spoil the adventure and, as I have learned, give a false impression about what is a truly remarkable piece of theatre.

I can tell you that if a list of plays existed that should be seen in a lifetime, this should be close to the top.  Often very funny and often deeply shocking The Pillowman has mesmerised audiences in the West End (where it starred David Tennant and Jim Broadbent) and on Broadway and received several awards including the Olivier Award for Best New Play and two Tony Awards. It has been described by various critics as a horror, a thriller, a comedy, a black comedy, a tragedy, a drama, different things to different men and women. To me it is simply The Pillowman, a special play in a special category all of its own.

Helping to tell this story are some fine actors including Andy Briggs (seen in Popcorn, Entertaining Mr Sloane), Gerald Bishop (Blithe Spirit, Measure for Measure), David Webster (The Full Monty, Feelgood), Paul Harris (Breaking the Silence, A Chorus of Disapproval), Viv Goodwin (Betrayal, Feelgood), Mike Martin (Journey’s End, Dinner) and Justine Greene (Lady Windermere’s Fan, The Dresser). All stories need first class story-tellers and with this bunch we certainly have that. They are expertly assisted by a first class crew, stage managed by the very talented Mr Alan Peck (The Full Monty, Feelgood).

I should warn you that at times The Pillowman is not easy to watch.  Not because of violence (of which it contains some) or bad language (of which it contains a lot) but because of the power of its words and the pictures it forces us to create in our minds. It has the power to make you laugh and then almost immediately make you question why you laughed, it has the power to shock you and then make you cry. It has the power to disturb you but make you want to see more.  It is an experience not to be missed and one that I know you’ll talk about for weeks. I advise you to book early because not only do you not want to miss it but a part of you might just want to come back.

Ultimately, like all good stories The Pillowman simply has a beginning, middle and an end.  It may start with “Once upon a time” but as for “happily ever after” – you’ll just have to find out.

BILL  BRAY introduces our next production

Kenneth Branagh, in an interview about his TV crime series, Wallander said, “There is an extraordinary appetite for stories of the cruel, the wicked and the vicious.” This appears to be true if you consider the constant stream on TV of police, crime and murder-solving entertainment. 

The theatre has its quota of similar material but if it is to achieve the excitement that is sought, the subject matter needs to move towards more extreme and frightening areas in order to satisfy the appetite. Our next production is a startling play and it may well shock you.

Martin McDonagh has used his Irish background as settings for his writing and we have seen three of his plays at the GWT – The Cripple of Inishmaan (2001), The Beauty Queen of Leenane (2004) and The Lieutenant of Inishmore (2006). Although he is not a native Irishman, being born in Camberwell of Irish parents, he has used his roots to explore the society of isolated parts of that troubled island. The first of the GWT productions picked up the true story of the film maker Robert Flaherty making a documentary film about the tough life of the fishermen of the Arran islands and crafted an imaginative play about a disabled young man, the cripple of the title, involved in the film. Again mingling hilarity with mental and physical cruelty,  The Lieutenant was about the Irish troubles, depicting the gory in-fighting of a maverick republican splinter-group.  Beauty Queen had its comedy and mental cruelty and culminated in matricide.

The Pillowman, originally seen at the National Theatre, was the first of McDonagh’s plays not set in Ireland. It has a nightmare quality and is close to fantasy and may be disturbing for some of our audience, but has its share of comedy. His next play, A Behanding in Spokane is due to open in New York early in March.

Of late his attention has been diverted from theatre into film. He wrote and directed his first major film In Bruges, which opened in 2008, winning a BAFTA Award for Best New Screenplay.