Alan in Belfast

Steel Magnolias – a warm welcome and a listening ear for the regulars in Truvy’s salon sanctuary every Saturday morning (Lyric Theatre until Friday 10 July)

2026-06-27T21:26:00.098+01:00

Hair salons can be a bit of a go to setting in theatre for safe ‘third’ spaces where women can gather and support each other. They’re places of community, of conversation and pampering aimed at boosting wellbeing across the sisterhood.

In Robert Harling’s 1987 play Steel Magnolias, chatty Truvy opens up the Louisiana salon attached to her home every Saturday morning, a precious time reserved for just her most regular customers. The audience watch six women spend four mornings in each other’s company.

The chairs in Truvy’s salon create a confessional environment, and she can sense what’s written in your heart by staring at your scalp, although the hairdresser offers polished nails and well-coiffed hair rather than psychoanalysis. Orla Mullan brings warmth and wit to the stylish mother hen whose own family have detached themselves from her love, Truvy’s heart has space for everyone’s complicated lives, particularly if she detects a whiff of romance.

The door onto the street opens and in walks M’Lynn who is long past even trying to temper the activities of her gun-toting husband. She pours all her concern into wanting the best for her daughter Shelby. The mental health counsellor carries so many people’s secrets and weaknesses. Janet Moran plays the character who most externalises her emotions with a quiet dignity and gravitas.

Pink-obsessed but never Barbie-like, Shelby is in her mid-20s. She lives with type 1 diabetes and is reluctant to let it dictate her life choices. Her first entrance into the salon is on the morning of her wedding. She’s finally on the cusp of cutting ties and claiming her independent. Simone Collins gives Shelby grit and determination as she lives with the consequences of her actions.

Meanwhile, town grandee Clairee is searching for meaning and identity amongst the busyness of life following the death of her husband who was the Mayor. Marion O’Dwyer’s Clairee lounges on the salon’s sofa and throws pithy one-liners into the mix, breaking up tension with hilarity.

Ouiser is never first on the scene but the twice-married moaning widow disrupts whatever’s happening anytime she storms through the salon door. Carol Moore is almost (and quite perfectly) typecast in this outspoken role, a spirited presence on stage when playwright Harling finally deems it necessary to deploy the unfiltered Ouiser into a scene. At times, the interactions between Clairee and Ouiser feel like something out of The Golden Girls, a US TV series that playwright Harling could well have been familiar with.

New to the town, Annelle is hired as a junior stylist and Truvy quickly adopts her almost as a daughter. Annelle’s reticence to talk about herself is gradually replaced with a boldness to speak about her flourishing faith as she tries to turn her life around. Early on in the play, Truvy opines to Clairee about Annelle “I think there’s a story here” remarks” … seeding a complete red herring in the dramatic thrust of the piece! Eímhear Jackson blends the slight Annelle into the background as she washes the hair and sets the rollers of customers before Annelle’s confidence rises and she starts sharing her uncompromising opinions.

Costume designer Catherine Kodicek has had great fun dressing the characters in bright colours and busy patterns. There’s a consistency to the Southern accents drilled into the cast by dialect coach Megan McDonnell. While working scissors are out of the question for a show that plays eight times a week, Mullan and Jackson confidently wash and style the salon’s customers in real time as the drama unfolds. Set designer Ronán Duffy sneaks in a couple of levels to the car port extension, using steps up to doors to give characters’ entrances a bit of a lift.

Walking into the main theatre, it was heartening to spot two fans gently spinning above the salon set. Outside the Lyric Theatre, the wind had finally picked up and the temperature noticeably dropped from a very muggy afternoon spent in its café celebrating the launch of arts critic Jane Coyle’s new book – A Better Locksmith – revisiting productions, personalities and turning points that have shaped stages across Northern Ireland.

Steel Magnolias is the latest in what has almost become a 2026 season of shows about strong women – The Human Voice (Prime Cut), Consumed (Paines Plough), Tea In A China Cup, Bold Girls (Centre Stage) – that will finish with a revival of 2024’s Little Women returning to the Lyric stage over Christmas. (Kabosh’s Cuckoo-Land, Tinderbox’s Animal Farm (both in The MAC) and Kabosh’s Mary Ann, The Forgotten Sister which returned recently over at Clifton House also deserve nods.)

After decades of men dominating writing, directing and acting the big roles, it’s good to see a rebalancing. Women in last night’s audience outnumbered men by about 10 to 1 which makes me wonder about whether audiences are driving programming or vice versa. Is the reliance on well-recognised titles (there’s a starry 1989 film version of Steel Magnolias) and dipping into the back catalogue of female playwrights’ older work about bringing commercially viable audiences into theatres? Contemporary theatre seems to be taking an even bigger back seat in these challenging times. Is this the new reality of theatregoing for larger venues in Northern Ireland?

What does an evening spent in a Louisiana hairdressers offer with six white women, talk of shrimp boils (the fishy equivalent of a meaty BBQ), and no mention of racial tensions? There’s a lot of references to acceptance in the play’s second act but the types of diversity are limited.

To be sure, after lots of per-interval exposition, and post-interval jeopardy, the final scene is an emotional roller-coaster that had ugly tears streaming down my face as the women form deeper perspectives on each other’s lives. Hats off to director Emily Foran for avoiding the earlier opportunities to introduce hysteria into the simmering ensemble and only letting things go properly wild at the denouement.

These six women rely on their inner steel to overcome personal and family adversity. They have learned that they can lean on each other through thick and thin. The relationships that they built in Truvy’s salon are not delicate. Once inducted into the Saturday morning club, they’re sure of companionship throughout any storms that hit their lives.

Steel Magnolias continues at the Lyric Theatre until Friday 10 July.

Photo credit: Carrie Davenport

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The Last Viking – Mads Mikkelsen delights in this brutal comedy Nordic noir (Queen’s Film Theatre from Friday 26 June)

2026-06-25T06:00:00.000+01:00

Part horror, part comedy, part Nordic noir, The Last Viking is a hard to pigeonhole film from Danish screenwriter and director Anders Thomas Jensen.

The premise is that when Anker (Nikolaj Lie Kaas) gets parole after 15 years in prison for his part in a heist, he takes his dognapping younger brother Manfred (brilliantly played by Mads Mikkelsen) back to the family’s old rural home to dig up the loot. The property is now run as an AirBnB by Margrethe (Sofie Gråbøl minus her Sarah Lund sweater) and her insufferable jazz bore husband Werner (Søren Malling). But an old gang member (an abruptly menacing Nicolas Bro) is willing to torture anyone who gets in his way of getting his hands on the missing money.

On-screen violence veers between cartoonish and horrifying. Anker’s spotless white shirts are inevitable ruined by blood. Then there’s the part where the Beatles is reformed by Anker’s new associate (Lars Brygmann), and some great ABBA covers are thrown in for good measure.

The cast is a Who’s Who of Danish acting royalty. A short opening animation with its tale of false equality sets the bloody tone for the rest of the film. Despite many characters having serious mental health problems – you’ll be an expert in dissociative identity disorder by the end of this two-hour film – no one is as “stupid” as they’re made out to be by the others.

The delightful script casually explores the notion that “everyone is entitled to their unique identity”. It sometimes asks how far any of us would go to protect someone. But mostly it lights a blazing fire and then throws fuel on it in the shape of trauma and greed to see who will get scorched.

There’s a reason that Jensen keeps returning to work with some of these actors: they aren’t afraid to fully immerse themselves in his madness. This will be one of the most memorable films you’ll see in 2026! The Last Viking is being screened at Queen’s Film Theatre from Friday 26 June.

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Heart of Hamelin – a well-told musical lesson about paying the piper or else he’ll call the tune (Market Place Theatre until Wednesday 24 June)

2026-06-24T14:22:12.441+01:00

The tale of the colourfully dressed piper who lures the rats away from an infested town and then takes revenge when the town renege on their promise to pay him is well known and no stranger to theatrical adaptations. Belfast Ensemble’s operatic take on the Pied Piper of Hamelin with The Musician during Belfast Children’s Festival in 2019 stands out as a good example.

Another new musical version has hit the stage in the form of Heart of Hamelin. Down in Armagh this week, writer/director Pamela Cassells-Totton and composer Jonny McGuinness take audiences back to 1284 with a talented youth cast who sing and act out the tale of local government mismanagement and child kidnapping.

The staging is simple but effective, with good use of widescreen projected backdrops and props that wheel on in swift scene changes that never slow down the storytelling. Pushing some of the sound effects and the piper’s melodies through speakers at the back of the auditorium gives a creepy, other-worldly feel to the emerging nightmare, alongside the long-tailed velvety rat costumes. The ensemble’s collective eyeline is used to steer the audience to focus on areas of stage.

A clever modern epilogue asks if we still find ourselves caught in the snare of the piper … although the contemporary snake oil salesman feels less likely to deliver on his expensive promises than the 1284 rat catcher.

There are strong performances across the talented cast. Eamonn Fleming is a commanding presence as the domineering Mayor, overruling a minority of council colleagues – particularly Elena (Katy Hazard) – who sense that not paying the rat catcher will be a mistake. The council meetings are passionate, and the machine gun dialogue has great rhythm. The townsfolk are suitably weary, then celebratory, then distraught as the rats vanish and an unexpected penalty is paid. Sam Anderson narrates (spoken and sung) aspects of the show playing the old man who can tell a suspiciously good tale!

Musical highlights include Mayor Jacob, wife Miriam (Emma McLean) and wanderlusting daughter Eliza (Sofia Cassells) singing Three World’s Apart. Hans and Ada (Shea Fox and Sarah Reynolds) are a great pairing, offering warm harmonies and joyful choreography in the first act Together and then Nothing Left to Say after the interval. Lame Tomas (Aodhan Fleming) and his mother Adele (Sophie McCullough) are well matched in The Memory Bench which feeds an earlier loss into the growing sense of doom.

“We need to act now to protect our town and our townspeople.”

Reviewing the performance on the tenth anniversary of the EU Referendum vote, there was more than a hint of Brexit woven through the script. Maybe my strong memories of a long sultry night at the Titanic count centre mean that I’m seeing something that isn’t intentionally there. But lines like “we’re always stronger when we’re together” echo campaign slogans. And picking out some snippets from an exchange in a fraught council chamber do sum up some people’s views of the referendum and what followed: “I warned you … no one could have predicted that … I predicted this … we hadn’t signed a contract .. can’t you see this is all of our faults … punishing us to teach us a lesson.”

The well-constructed plotting of the central family groups and council meetings, together with Jonny’s McGuinness’s collection of catchy and lamentful tunes, and the confident cast of 36 drawn from the Pamela Cassells School of Performance (now in its 25th year) who make it look almost effortless, all contribute to making Heart of Hamelin a production that achieves high standards. Heart of Hamelin premiered at Theatre at the Mill back in March, and is being performed in Armagh’s Market Place Theatre until Wednesday 24 June.

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Cutting Through Rocks – an emancipating hustler who tries to push back against the stifling patriarchy (Docs Ireland at Queen’s Film Theatre)

2026-06-22T19:07:12.989+01:00

The village councillor elected with the most votes traditionally holds the official stamp to notarise paperwork. That’s the rule in this rural region of Iran. But when a women stands for election for the first time, and tops the poll, the men suddenly insist that the oldest elected councillor – a man – should wield the stamp, not the most popular. Nonsense says Sara Shahverdi.

She’s the sixth child – the sixth daughter – in her family, and her father treated her like the son he longed for. She was taught to ride a motorbike, how to use tools, and to dress as it suited her. Sara was 16 when her father died: her older sisters were already married, and she became the breadwinner for her mother and her three younger brothers.

Cutting Through Rocks is a documentary by directors Mohammadreza Eyni and Sara Khaki that offers a rare glimpse of life in rural Iran. The narrative arc quickly establishes that women almost unthinkingly acquiesce to even the flimsiest suggestions of the men around them. Sara stands up to her younger brothers when they try to rob her sisters of their inheritance. She’s a divorced midwife who pleads with girls in the local school to pledge to get an education and achieve their dreams of being doctors and teachers rather than being forced to get married so young.

Fereshteh was one of the 400 or more babies Sara delivered. When she hears that Fereshteh, who was married at 12, is now seeking a divorce, but if successful faces her parents marrying her off for a second time, Sara mediates and gets the parents’ permission for the teenager to live with her. But as the film has already shown in a much more minor matter, parental choice won’t stop other relatives knowing best and violently intervening.

“When you’re ready, release the gas without fear,” Sara tells Fereshteh as she teaches her to ride on wasteland.

While Sara appears to be as strongminded as she is unorthodox – wearing trousers, a hat and scarf to cover herself up and still be able to ride a motorbike – the film shows that the vindictive behaviour of men takes a heavy toll. Overruling her plans for a circular playpark and (re)marking out the land in a square is petty. Rather than attack how she uses her power as a councillor, they instead crudely complain to a judge about her very identity and sexuality. The emancipating hustler who can convince ordinary people to veer from tradition to vote for her, to sign half their property over to their wives, to allow their children to go for a bike ride in public … has limits.

Like so many judicial and quasi-judicial processes at home and abroad, there’s no comeback or jeopardy for those making vexatious complaints and false allegations. A judge suggests that single Sara needs to “get married soon” and “stop helping women as much”.

“To do something unconventional, you have to expect consequences” she muses when a girl is slapped by her uncle for daring to be out on a motorbike. Several times during the 95-minute documentary, Sara allows older men to win arguments over the actions of younger girls. It’s as if even Sara can’t stand up to that tradition.

In the end, facing exhaustion from round after round of push back and attack, her Dad’s empowering influence and hard-learned patience may help Sara accept baby steps over the huge leaps she wants to see in her community.

Cutting Through Rocks is a powerful documentary shown as part of Docs Ireland. Hopefully it will return to the Queen’s Film Theatre in the coming months.

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Earth, Wind & Fire (To Be Celestial vs That's the Weight of the World) – the story of how Maurice White steered the band (Docs Ireland at Queen’s Film Theatre)

2026-06-22T12:47:20.090+01:00

Maurice White was a kalimba-playing drummer, a lead singer, a songwriter, a producer, and the man who controlled the always vibrant yet quite eclectic genre-spanning sound of the Earth, Wind & Fire band over many decades. Having set sail with a vision for a nine-piece band, he steered their recordings through rough waters of personnel changes, tacking to catch the wind of disco and electronic as audience preferences drifted away from the band’s original sound (which one early reviewer tried to sum up as “Afro-gospel-jazz-blues-rock”).

As well as charting the band’s chart and touring prowess, new documentary Earth, Wind & Fire (To Be Celestial vs That's the Weight of the World) focuses on White’s contribution to their successes … and failures. His concepts overruled the other band members. His financial reward seems to have outweighed their more modest pay packets. His vision for elaborate stage shows and costumes meant that their extensive tours operated at a deficit. And his on the road philandering fathered at least two children that his wife wasn’t aware of. His ego swelled, yet the band had to go to ever more extreme lengths to reinvent themselves as the music market changed around them.

White’s story arc begins with his tough upbringing in Memphis and links his “abandonment” as a child (when his mother left him behind with a friend and moved state to get work … and a whole new family in Chicago) with his decision to abruptly put the band into a three-year hiatus from 1984–1987. His darker character traits are fulsomely acknowledged, though kept clear from the final scenes which allow the band’s legacy to be gloriously celebrated.

Directed by Questlove (Ahmir Khalib Thompson), the talking heads of band members and contemporary artists are accompanied by extensive footage from tours, and (far too) prominently bookmarked by contributions from superfans former President Barack and Michelle Obama: EWF were the first band to perform in the White House after Obama took office, playing at the Governors’ Dinner.

Some of the best moments come when fellow artists critique why EWF’s sound was so distinctive. Lionel Richie summed it up: “The funk was the funk, but the chords were jazz, classical. Meanwhile, it’s sitting on this tribal African beat.”

The editing is sharp, intercutting different performances of the same song to add sparkle and energy to less dynamic footage. Though perhaps more groundwork is laid than absolutely necessary in the first third of this two-hour long film that sometimes risks being led by the set list over the story. Maurice White reckoned that “music saved me” from his Memphis experience of poverty and brutality at the hands of the (white) police. This new documentary certainly captures his spirit and his drive. I look forward to a week when Radio Ulster’s Steven Rainey showcases Earth, Wind & Fire on his Sunday afternoon Long Player programme.

Earth, Wind & Fire (To Be Celestial vs That's the Weight of the World) was screened in Queen’s Film Theatre on Sunday 21 June as part of the Docs Ireland festival. Unfortunately, the film doesn’t seem to be getting a wider cinema release and will instead be available on the small screen on HBO Max. Turn your volume up loud if you’re watching it at home!

ABCD

Enough is Enough (Trop C’est Trop) – exposing the conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo to global audiences (Docs Ireland at Queen’s Film Theatre)

2026-06-20T13:36:49.498+01:00

“A window on the world” was how a former radio editor used to describe the Sunday morning slots when I’d find a valid excuse to bring the situation in an oft-forgotten place in the world to the attention of local listeners. Sometimes it was Lebanon (with its fractious confessional political system, failed financial sector, and a much-stalled judge-led inquiry into the port blast) or South Sudan (where it’s estimated that over 80% of the population need humanitarian assistance) or the Democratic Republic of the Congo (the second largest country in Africa and the second or third most populous nation in the continent, the scene of conflict for many decades, and a rich source of valuable minerals).

There are parts of the world where major news organisations don’t always have a permanent bureau and correspondents don’t often pass through. I remember searching for a journalist who could help us cover the fall of the eastern city of Goma from government and UN forces to the M23 rebels last year. English-speaking national newspapers might mention DRC a handful of times each year. The country will usually only merit a couple of sentences in radio news bulletins.

Elisé Sawasawa was born in 1994 and has grown up knowing only conflict in his country. His first feature-length documentary Enough Is Enough (Trop C’est Trop) explains that “after walking more than 30 kilometres to escape the horrors, my mother gave birth to me in the forest. The crackle of bullets is part of the music that welcomed me to this earth.”

The film is centred around the city of Goma where he lives. Scenes are sustained long enough that audiences can up a sense of the pattern of what they’re seeing: for example, people approaching on foot and bicycle carrying as many possessions and livestock as they can muster, while armoured military vehicles begin to drive against the human flow.

There’s a very large UN mission in the city. That didn’t stop the M23 rebels taking over the area last year. We watch as civilians protest: against blue-bereted UN peacekeepers (who have been accused of not protecting civilians), Rwanda (whose forces provided military support to the M23 movement), as well as general armed forces and police on the street.

It’s often confusing, and quite possibly contradictory, but when no one’s on your side, everyone becomes a target. The film captures dancers, poets and a performance artist: despite the aggression and oppression, people continue to use art and culture to express their feelings.

Around 7 million people in DRC are internally displaced (out of a total population that exceeds 105 million), with several large refugee camps around Goma. Cholera is common. Since the documentary was completed, Ebola has joined the infectious diseases threatening the population.

DRC mines feed into the supply chain global technology and vehicle/battery companies. But the rich (locally and international) are profiting, not the everyday citizens.

Frustration and anger are rife.

Sawasawa documents with handheld footage that is in the throng rather than looking from a distance. Enough is Enough is his raw perspective on experincing the constant conflict that has dominated his life. It’s an eye-opening insight into a city and a country that is so hard to follow from afar.

Enough is Enough was screened in Queen’s Film Theatre as part of Docs Ireland documentary film festival which runs until Sunday 21 June. (links to my festival preview and the full programme)

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American Doctor – three US medics expose the conditions inside and outside Gaza’s Nasser Hospital (Docs Ireland at Queen’s Film Theatre on 17 June and then UK/Ireland release from 25 September)

2026-06-17T09:45:16.085+01:00

Three American-born doctors travel to Gaza during a 2025 ceasefire to work in the Nasser Hospital hospital. This isn’t their first rodeo and while they’re comfortable leaving their cosy lives in the US behind to work in a warzone, they’re still shocked by the environment in which their patients are living and undergoing treatment.

Hand surgeon Mark Perlmutter is a Jewish American. He’s outspoken, calling Israel’s action “a genocide”. He wonders if his tax-dollars have paid for the munitions that are injuring the children he’s treating. Trauma surgeon Feroze Sidwa was born the US to Pakistani parents who belong to the non-Muslim Parsi minority. Emergency medicine physician Thaer Ahmad is a Palestian American, born in the US. At first, he is refused entry to Gaza: not all American doctors are treated equally.

Right from the outset, American Doctor pitches itself as an examination of morality. Whether it’s a medic arguing with filmmaker Poh Si Teng about why the bodies of dead children shouldn’t be pixelated, critiquing US news networks who push back on their lived experience of the conflict, or questioning why hospitals – including the one they volunteer in – are targeted by Israeli forces.

Following the three men around the hospital in operating theatres, hospital corridors, and phone calls home builds up a sense of the crazy normal of the Nasser Hospital. Pain medicine is in short supply. Gaza’s health infrastructure has been decimated. Equipment that would offer better patient outcomes simply isn’t available. An ambulance riddled with bullet holes sits around the back of the hospital near a mound of earth on the site of a mass grave burying the dead from a previous attack in the vicinity.

While the camera follows the three Americans (who mostly fail to fall into the “white saviour” stereotype) it lingers on the patients – children and adults – and the local staff who have to live all year around in a region that is under attack.

With foreign journalists banned from entering Gaza, the doctors are happy to talk to the media to relay what they’ve seen and experienced. They face presenters on the big US networks who default to an IDF-believing/Palestinian-sceptical stance. Everything the doctors say is questioned and challenged. Yet everything Israeli sources state in press releases seems to be taken as gospel. Senior American politicians receive the doctors politely in Washington DC corridors of power, but don’t seem to be sympathetic to their perspectives.

The doctors question why civilian hospitals are being attacked in what they see as a breach of Geneva Conventions. They see no evidence of secret tunnels under the buildings in which they work. When Israeli forces break the ceasefire and bomb the hospital’s second-floor male surgical ward (justified as targeting someone on the ward who is deemed to be a terrorist), one doctor is forced to operate again on a patient he’s already treated.

Some audiences will swerve this film, believing that the IDF are totally justified in targeting Hamas terrorists and that nearby innocent civilians, medical staff and facilities are necessary ‘collateral damage’. They’ll deem American Doctor to be pro-Hamas propaganda without even viewing it. Nothing to see here.

But if you want to judge for yourself the many moral questions for Israel, Gaza and big nations like the US that are raised in this film, you can catch a screening at 18:15 on Wednesday 17 June in Queen’s Film Theatre on day two of Docs Ireland documentary film festival. American Doctor will also be released in UK and Irish cinemas from 25 September. (links to my festival preview and the full programme)

It’s also worth noting that earlier this year – after filming had completed – Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders) suspended its work at Nasser Hospital for three months. Extracts from the MSF FAQ explain:

On 13 April 2026, MSF resumed core medical activities at Nasser hospital. This resumption comes after we initially suspended non-critical medical activities on 20 January. We had made the difficult decision to suspend non-critical activities after our colleagues witnessed a series of incidents, including the presence of masked armed men, others engaging in intimidation and carrying out arbitrary arrests of patients, and one incident that involved the suspected movement of weapons, all of which are completely unacceptable.
MSF raised our concerns regarding the management of the structure, the safeguarding of its neutrality, and security breaches to the relevant authorities. We have continuously engaged with Gaza’s Ministry of Health since and have determined that the concrete improvements taken by the relevant authorities, such as measures to restrict the entry of weapons, provide the minimum conditions required for our teams to work safely and in line with our working principles ...
Nasser hospital is a critical lifeline, and one of the last remaining, partially functioning Ministry of Health hospitals in Gaza. It must be respected and protected as a civilian medical facility, in accordance with international humanitarian law.
Our calls shouldn't be instrumentalised. We have seen Israel obliterating the health system in Gaza with the justification that they are being used as command centres or for military purposes, which we never witnessed. The hospital must be spared from Israeli attacks, and it must not be used for any military purposes by Hamas or any other armed groups. The lives of countless Palestinians depend on it. Hospitals must remain neutral, civilian spaces, free from military presence or activity, to ensure the safe and impartial delivery of medical care.

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Displace: The Battle For Dublin – a story of rebuilding community in the midst of precarity, planning and protest (Docs Ireland at An Cultúrlann on Thursday 18 June)

2026-06-16T13:33:20.296+01:00

Ireland’s housing crisis is multifaceted. Displace: The Battle For Dublin documents buildings lying derelict, landlords choosing to ‘no fault’ evict families on their sixth anniversary renting flats, artists being thrown out of their studio spaces despite being long-standing tenants, pockets of land that service communities being redeveloped for profit.

The lack of accommodation (affordable or not) is argued to be a result of commercial overdevelopment, exploitation of poor renter protections, and underinvestment in initiatives that could heal fractured communities.

James Redmond’s gentle pacing introduces the audience to people living precariously, unsure if their poorly maintained accommodation will ever be repaired (there’s an example of a large landlord taking nine years to fix a broken window), people wondering whether they’ll have a home to live in this time next year. We are introduced to individuals who are organising neighbours to form tenacious residents’ groups that can stand up to their wealthy landlords. And we see when lobbying and meetings turn to last ditch street protests.

There’s a quick lesson in ‘asset urbanism’, the concept of the rich making decisions about the urban landscape, using it as a playground for making money, with home owners and small commercial and cultural renters pawns in a bigger game of wealth extraction. Pockets of land become instruments of investment rather than habitats for humans to live and thrive.

Dublin is not alone in having a housing crisis. Locking people out of the city in which they grew up is common. Local government enabling commercial companies to delay redevelopment is not unusual. But despite the Celtic tiger, despite Dublin being the European home to so many multinational tech giants, it’s particularly chilling that there is such underinvestment in community-building that would benefit citizens in this city.

In Belfast and elsewhere up t’north, the derelict buildings tend to mysteriously combust at night, sometimes making it more necessary to be demolished. It’s hard to watch the film without wondering what a thriving North Street Arcade would be like and why the poorly-named Tribeca Belfast project had been allowed to stagnate for so long. Maybe the scenes about the ‘blandmarks’ walking tour will inspire a Belfast version being developed.

Displace: The Battle For Dublin carries a sense of lament throughout its 100-minute essay on the accommodation crisis. The sense that hope is being lost is strong. But its humanisation weaves in moments of celebration and appreciation amongst the sequences of communities being pulled apart or squashed.

Throughout the film the character of buildings pops out from the screen with gorgeous black and white cinematography. Good people look tired. Protests look earnest. The final credits list contributors like a roll call of saints.

The last sequence suggests that a minor victory might be around the corner for one community. Yet the very fact that so many people need to move off the site for a number of years leaves the lingering worry that the redevelopment could still be delayed or dropped. It feels like a cake-fuelled ending that may yet have to fade into a title card that says “six years later, none of the residents were back living on the site”. Hopefully that’s not the case …

Displace: The Battle For Dublin is being screened as part of the Docs Ireland documentary film festival at 19:00 on Thursday 18 June in An Cultúrlann. Docs Ireland runs from 16 to 21 June. (links to my festival preview and the full programme)

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Previewing Docs Ireland 2026 - six days of documentary delicacies (16-21 June)

2026-06-15T20:59:42.502+01:00

Documentary film festival Docs Ireland is back for the eighth time with a smorgasbord of films.

The majority of screenings are Pay What You Want.

Amid the myriad of shorts, talks and screenings, here are a handful that caught my eye from the chunky programme.

Tuesday 16 June

Steal This Story // 18:30 at QFT // The festival’s opening night gala spotlights the work of independent US journalist Amy Goodman who has been telling stories neglected by larger networks and holding the powerful to account for over three decades. Goodman will be present for a Q&A after the screening. SOLD OUT

Wednesday 17 June

American Doctor // 18:15 at QFT // Three US physicians return to Gaza during a ceasefire. Their work in operating theatres and hospital corridors is documented before they return home and take what they’ve seen to the corridors of power and the US Congress. (REVIEWED)

Thursday 18 June

Once You Shall Be One Of Those Who Lived Long Ago // 12:00 at QFT // A northern Swedish town is slowly collapsing into the iron ore mines beneath it. Prosperity goes hand in hand with disappearance. A melancholic, humorous and absurd look at a settlement in its dying days.

Now We’re Talking: Michael J Murphy and Sam Hanna Bell on screen // 13:00 at PRONI // Celebrating two important local cultural voices – folklorist and playwright Michael J Murphy and producer/author/editor Sam Hanna Bell – whose personal archives have been donated to the Public Records Office of Northern Ireland and have been catalogued and curated. A TV profile of Murphy being interviewed by Bell will be followed by a radio interview with Bell reflecting on his writing life, finishing with a film created by Drumintee Primary School inspired by the work of Murphy. (The same programme will also be screened in the shadow of Slieve Gullion in Tí Chullainn in Mullaghbawn at 19:00 on Saturday 20 June.) [You can find out more about Michael J Murphy in the Nerve Centre podcast series I helped make earlier this year with a group who explored his archive.]

Displace: The Battle For Dublin // 19:00 at An Cultúrlann // Gorgeous black and white cinematography and remarkable community building shine a light on the multi-faceted housing crisis in Dublin. Asset urbanism is stripping money out of areas along with the communities that enlivened them. But can citizens meaningfully fight back? (REVIEWED)

Ghost in the Machine // 20:30 at QFT // Vlerie Veatch’s documentary pores over the history of Artificial Intelligence and its ties between governments and private equity. Can we trust the people fashioning the regulation and holding the purse strings?

Friday 19 June

Trop C’est Trop (Enough is Enough) // 18:15 at QFT // The enduring conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo rarely makes it to news bulletins or newspaper reports. Elsié Sawasawa’s film bears witness to the Congolese people trapped in the endless fighting as the Congolese army protecting a regional capital are overpowered by rebels in just four days.

Lesbian Lines // 18:30 at QFT // Director Cara Holmes explores the hidden history of the underground network of lesbian helplines that operated across Ireland, mixing fear with fun and a celebration of togetherness as women who felt trapped found a chink of light. (REVIEWED)

Saturday 20 June

Desert Passages // 18:00 at QFT // Look after your water sources and waterways before it’s too late. With the 1,450 mile long Colorado River being diverted to new settlements and industry along its path down form the Rocky Mountains, the borderlands of the US and Mexico are experiencing drought. A brooding documentary with gorgeous visuals. (REVIEWED)

Cutting Through Rocks // 20:15 at QFT // Sara is the first elected councilwoman in her Iranian village. The complexity of Iran is displayed as she challenges patriarchal traditions by training teenage girls to ride motorcycles and stopping child marriages. (REVIEWED)

Sunday 21 June

Earth, Wind & Fire // 15:00 at QFT // Tracking the fractious yet fructuous history of the experiment band who started out as afro-gospel-jazz-blues-rock and would go on to define disco sound with songs like Let’s Groove Tonight. (REVIEWED)

Magilligan // 18:15 at QFT // The festival’s closing night film (preceded by the festival awards ceremony) presents a portrait of Ryan, a teenager imprisoned for a violent offence who finds purpose working on the prison farm but upon release finds his past hard to shake off. After the screening, Belfast director Ross McClean will be interviewed about his feature debut by Myrid Carten (director of last year’s closing film A Want In Her).

The full programme can be viewed on the Docs Ireland website.

Lesbian Lines – the network of helplines that offered connection, protection and solidarity (Docs Ireland in the Queen’s Film Theatre on Friday 19 June)

2026-06-15T18:11:41.737+01:00

Quite a number of LGBT organisations across the island have recently been sifting through their archives and reflecting on many decades of support and advocacy. In parallel, a number of cultural productions have been documenting the early days of these groups. Kabosh staged Dominic Montague’s Callings (2022) looking back at Cara Friend helplines. Kabosh and Montague were also responsible for the electrifying A Queer Céilí at the Marty Forsythe (2019)

Films like Rebel Dykes (2021) give a sense for the lesbian scene in London in the 1980s and 1990s. Cara Holmes’ new documentary Lesbian Lines hears from women involved with the network of lesbian helplines that ran – and continue to run – across Ireland. What starts off as a celebration of the almost underground community offering connection, protection and solidarity then examines key moments of lesbian visibility in Ireland, before acknowledging some of the darker calls the helplines received.

Back in 1980, 26-year-old Joni Crone appeared on The Late Late Show. Host Gay Byrne asked “What would compel a girl like you to appear on a programme like this and blow as it where her cover?” Later Byrne in the interview would refer to lesbians as “these people”. The host adopted a patronising tone throughout, but Crone kept her cool – perhaps aided by the backstage vodka someone in the production team recommended to calm her nerves! – and explained what it was like to live as a lesbian in Ireland.

Cinematographer Aidan Gault uses shadows and dim lighting for the interviews that sustain the storytelling. It’s almost like the women are sitting in a closet. There’s a mix of testimony, dramatic reconstruction and conversation.

Outburst Queer Arts Festival director Ruth McCarthy is among those interviewed. And there’s a snippet of archive from Free Presbyterian minister Rev David McIlveen to remind viewers of the opposition to homosexuality. Footage of the security search barriers on Royal Avenue grounds the film in a period of history which will seem alien to younger audiences but remain all too vivid for some of us oldies.

Last year’s Docs Ireland festival screened the Housewife of the Year documentary (which Holmes edited) about the now-jarring pageant of domesticity. Lesbian Lines opens a door onto another side of how society in Ireland slowly changed.

Responsible for the clamouring soundtrack of Irish folk horror Fréwaka, Die Hexen sensitively allows scenes to breath: there’s no sense of urgency, and when the mood dips, the music fades as more sombre and tragic moments are remembered. A volunteer recalls a woman ringing up in a distressed state before being cut off when an angry man comes into the room. Beaten up by her husband, she dials back the next week from hospital. Another volunteer remembers callers contemplating suicide.

Voiced up conversations based on the extensive phone logs give an insight into the vulnerability of those moments, and intimacy of people feeling safe enough to open up to a stranger and remove their mask.

Like another Docs Ireland screening – Displace: The Battle for Dublin – Lesbian Lines is a film about a silenced section of society nurturing community, allowing people to find their voice and find their tribe. Considerable fear is mixed in with fun and a celebration of togetherness as women who felt trapped find a chink of light.

You can catch Lesbian Lines at the Docs Ireland documentary film festival at 18:30 on Friday 19 June in Queen’s Film Theatre. Docs Ireland runs from 16 to 21 June. (links to my festival preview and the full programme)

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Bold Girls – facing up to the unpalatable whole truth and choosing how to move on (Centre Stage at the Lyric Theatre until Sunday 14 June)

2026-06-14T16:51:16.778+01:00

Bold Girls is located somewhere in and around the Falls Road/Anderstown Road in west Belfast in the late 1980s. Cassie lives with her mum Nora and kids across the road from Marie. These women are rich in ambition, poor in pocket, and they’ve been hiding secrets from each other and possibly from themselves. Phil Jennings’ simple maroon-themed kitchen set floats above the Lyric’s Naughton Studio stage, a dias for teal-spilling and dealing with the past.

An early question “Do you believe in ghosts?” sets up the non-supernatural appearance of Deirdre (Annie McIlwaine), never not dress in white, who lurks in the vicinity of Marie and Nora wherever they go.

Director Michael Quinn freezes the action – aided by Jennings’ sharp spotlighting – as characters deliver thoughtful monologues to the audience. An episode of ITV’s Blind Date plays in the corner, emphasising the neighbours’ vacuum of romantic relationships and their lust for love.

Rona Munro’s dialogue excels at allowing the lively women to speak at cross-purposes, with three people often conducting two different conversations in beautiful harmony. An unseen washing machine is an early source of humour. But this play is no comedic sitcom.

Caroline Curran sports a brunette wig and plays Marie with warmth and wit: a feeder who welcomes even the stranger into her kitchen and can knock up a sandwich in the middle of the night. (The rest of the cast had better like Curran’s sandwiches as there’s a lot of eating on two show days!)

The first act sets Marie up as a cheerful single mother who idolises her dead husband. Bold Girls asks whether any of these women can make their own decisions and escape the orbit of their men folk, who are either dead or incarcerated, and remain absent from the stage. Can they truly run away from their past and other people’s past actions?

Marie’s steady attitude is knocked in the aftermath of a trip to the local nightclub when her more sporty neighbour Cassie (played with engaging vigour by Hannah Carnegie) opens up and shares a succession of pieces of distressing news. Throughout, dream-stealing Deirdre loiters with unsure intent.

Anger bleeds into Curran’s happy-go-lucky portrayal of Marie as the young mother pushes back on other people’s legacy. Meanwhile Cassie’s mum (played by Mairead McKinley) is waking up to the fact that other people are denying her nice things. The most powerful scene comes when the women – all of whom should know better – take the side of heinous men against their kith and kin.

The characters are well drawn, the laughs keep rolling, and 36 years after its première, Rona Munro’s script still has much to say about this conflicted society where can women be left to suffer the cost of their partners’ actions. It’s a simpler yet at least as effective companion piece to the Lyric’s recent production of Tea in a China Cup.

Centre Stage’s revival of Bold Girls finishes its sold out run at the Lyric Theatre on Sunday 14 June.

Photo credit: Rebecca Jane Windsor

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Desert Passages – brooding documentary about a disappearing water source (Docs Ireland in Queen’s Film Theatre on Saturday 20 June)

2026-06-14T11:40:59.916+01:00

Snow melting in the Rocky Mountains provides up to 90% of the water flowing down the 1,450-mile-long Colorado River. It’s all but dried up by the time it reaches the ocean. Desert Passages is a gently told story of decline. There’s less snow to melt. Water is evaporating from reservoirs faster than before. Population and agricultural growth along the flow means that water is being “diverted to people as opposed to moving people to water” as one contributor explains.

Beautiful cinematography serves up striking vistas. Red stone contrasts with concrete dams. A drone camera flies low over the water like a modern recreation of a scene from 1980’s Air Wolf. Tide marks along the side of rock faces show the huge change in high water level.

The contributors are thoughtful rather than angry. There’s a stoicism that talks of adapting to the new reality of drought rather than voluntary or forced displacement of populations to land that can better support them. Towns in Arizona truck water in. The landscape becomes increasingly barren as the river almost impotent in its final hundred mile stretch into Mexico. Homes and habitats have changed forever. Climate refugees are on the rise but have no protection under the 1951 Refugee Convention.

Desert Passages is a brooding documentary that places layers of similar detail on top of each other like a papier-mâché construction. The quickly established premise that access to water isn’t evenly spread and made worse by human decisions is almost diluted by repetition. The visuals distract from the oral duplication that stretches the film out to 77 minutes.

The film’s many moments of silence will give time for Northern Ireland audiences to consider the plight of Lough Neagh. While it’s a story of pollution from agriculture and sewage, exacerbated by arising summer temperatures that allow the blue-green algae to bloom, Jan Carson’s latest novel Few and Far Between imagines a populated archipelago in the lough, created by a government programme to reduce the water level. The residents face an existential threat of a flood to tackle the algae bloom in this fictional universe. (Just one of a number of threats the author conjures up!)

Look after your water sources and waterways before it’s too late. That’s the message of Kevin Brennan and Laurence Durkin’s new film that is being screened as part of the Docs Ireland documentary film festival at 6pm on Saturday 20 June in Queen’s Film Theatre.

PS: Watch out for the Vatican Advanced Technology Telescope.

Docs Ireland runs from 16 to 21 June. (links to my festival preview and the full programme)

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Report on June 2026 PCI General Assembly #pciga26

2026-06-14T11:19:04.657+01:00

On top of the violence and disorder on the streets, there were three themes running through the four days of this year’s higgledy-piggledy General Assembly: Safeguarding, Finance and Reconfiguration, and the three were quite interlinked at points.

Three and a half days of business stretched into four. (You can still watch back the live-stream from Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.) Here’s a few highlights from my four days attending ... though lots more of note happened that I haven’t commented on, like the timely sermon during Thursday lunchtime’s worship. (Update - Deborah Sloan’s summery of proceedings is well worth a read too.)

My takeaway observations are that:

Members of General Assembly are incurious and few seemed to have (taken the time to) read the Blue Book (main and supplementary reports) from cover to cover. (I recommend working from the back towards the front as General Council’s multiple sections make more sense once you’ve got a picture of the other councils’ work.)
The lack of coverage of the General Assembly’s business outside of the News Letter and Belfast Telegraph is an indication that PCI is currently being defined by its response to the safeguarding crisis. The commitment to openness about learning is to be welcomed.
Wordy reports, corporate communications and press releases don’t cut through in a world that prefers to hear about the experience of individuals so the denomination’s much-needed response to racism and violence against women and girls needs to be shared in a way that it will be heard. (That said, the background work to respond to NI Executive and Assembly Committee consultations is also important and worthwhile.)
The process to restructure how the denomination operates – which is being driven by a hydra of task groups – will also have to take into account the results of INEQE investigation due next June. It would be wise to plan for a Special Assembly in November 2027 to address the final Structures proposals as it’s already clear that final decisions would be unwise and unlikely in June 2027.

Disclosure: I’m a member of the Presbyterian Church and sit on the Support Services Committee (whose private business doesn’t inform my public reporting). And I've read enough blue books of reports and sat through so many General Assemblies I can nearly spot when resolutions are taken in the wrong order (they were at one point this year) and could almost explain PCI’s version of the‘offside rule’ (when an amendment becomes the substantive motion and there’s unexpectedly more time for debate)!

Business at this week’s Presbyterian General Assembly was disrupted by what was happening outside the Assembly Hall.

The opening day’s business on Tuesday was curtailed by the online threats of disruption with the evening session cancelled and delegates sent home. Many of the delegates use public transport to travel in and out of Belfast. Wednesday’s late afternoon installation of the new moderator was postponed, the civic guests cancelled, and delegates sent home at lunchtime. Many traybakes for the moderator’s bun-worry were wasted.

Outgoing moderator Richard Murray served an extra day in office and Richard Kerr was finally installed at 10:38 on Thursday morning. So there was a lot of shuffling of business and reduced times for some speeches to catch up on the lapsed business which finally concluded just after 4pm on Friday afternoon.

Richard Murray said he was “appalled” at the knife attack in North Belfast. Prayers were offered over several days for the victim, and then (to quote) “for ethnic minorities who live among us” and for people whose homes, vehicles and work places had been attacked. The Moderator said that the rioting “has also left us appalled”. He said that the right to protest did not extend to a right to riot, or a right to intimidate or to threaten or to take life. Speaking on behalf of the denomination, he appealed “to the wider community for peace and calm, and for sense to prevail”.

Former Moderator Frank Sellar also commented on what he called “sinister” scenes with protesters wearing balaclavas to disguise their identities. He went on to address the latest unsolicited and anonymous email from a person or group called Troubled Presbyterians sent to most ministers. He said the emails were “sinister” and the issues should be more properly raised on the floor of the Assembly. “Please stop sending these emails … it’s important that we do everything we do is done openly and transparently … please stop hiding behind balaclavas.”

Could the church be prophetic in tackling racism? Or at least make a difference in changing public attitudes and protecting those who are experiencing racism everyday? Those weren’t questions the General Assembly considered. [Although I’ve been told of a Belfast congregation experiencing racism-related damage to their building.]

Back in 2021 General Assembly heard that “Racism and inclusion are very challenging issues that appear in many forms and guises. Through following up on research initiatives, one aim is to keep abreast of the experiences of ethnic minorities in churches on the island of Ireland, with a view to ensuring PCI’s own house is in order before seeking to call society to account. In addition to grappling with issues such as colonialism, empire, and the spiritual battle against fear, prejudice, and segregation, PCI will need to reflect on the place of ethnic minorities in leadership roles within the Church.”

General Assembly reports stated that “issues around the welcome, support for and integration of refugees and other ethnic minorities, together with challenging racism and negative stereotyping, is a cross-cutting issue across various councils of PCI.”

PCI’s central work on inter-cultural relations has somewhat stalled in recent years. Addressing racism as individual Christians and as congregations could become a priority. The Irish Council of Churches – whose general secretary Rev Dr Karen Campbell is one of the new moderator’s chaplains – did some work on this last year in response to the race riots, and their 2010 report on Migration, Diversity and Interculturalism would give PCI a head start.

After November’s announcement about central safeguarding failures and two Special General Assembles, there were updates on the various safeguarding reviews and investigations.

General Assembly heard that “to protect the integrity of the police investigation there is relatively little we can say about it at this stage”.

Regarding the INEQE (prounced ‘in-eek’) review of governance and safeguarding for the Charity Commission, it is “progressing well” and the group led by Jim Gamble will soon begin gathering information from congregations and individuals. Completion of the report is due by June 2027.

General Council has committed to publish the findings of that Charity Commission review and the learning within (except where it would contradict legal obligations regarding data protection).

Incoming clerk Jonathan Boyd who is currently convenor of the Statutory Investigations Advisory Task Group which has been advising Richard Murray in his liaison role said that it was part of our reformed conviction that God can use the civil authorities to address problems in the church and we should thank God for the work he does through the civil authorities to correct and purify the Church. (It’s not clear whether the former moderator remains the main liaison point for the PSNI, or whether that will shift to his successor or someone else.)

The work to support the investigations and reviews was said to have been onerous and prioritised. The sentiment that other normal work of the denomination has been sidelined and delayed was echoed in several Council reports. One report in particular went as far as to say that unintentionally prioritising safeguarding, updating the Code and reconfiguration of ministry had led to “neglect [that] has significantly weakened the local church”.

Convenor of the General Council David Bruce said he believed the denomination is being chastised and their reputation will need to be rebuilt from the ground up. He told the Assembly that “over the course of the past six months, I have met personally with several people at their request, either in their homes or elsewhere, and I have corresponded with others, as have [other senior church figures] and members of our Safeguarding Team. This has not been perfect, and I want to apologise sincerely for the times when the church’s central responses to emerging situations have caused further distress.”

Outgoing moderator Richard Murray preached at very start of his fourth General Assembly in the chair. He said “it has been a torrid time for us in PCI” adding later in his sermon that “it’s been a tough seven or eight months for the denomination and many have been left disheartened and discouraged by our failures in safeguarding”.

But he questioned whether balance had been lost in a hard-hitting part of his address: “I’ve been hearing a lot about polity over the last seven months … but I haven’t heard anyone talking about spirituality. I’ve been hearing a lot about the Code … but I’d love to hear a lot more about compassion. I’ve been hearing a lot about covenant but I’d love to hear a lot more about conversion.”

New moderator Richard Kerr’s theme is “For God so loved”, an invitation (from chapter 1 of the gospel of John) to refocus on what is at the core of Christian faith: to refocus on the lavish love of God, the centrality of the cross, and the ongoing work of the Holy Spirit. He said that he hopes that the investigations and inquiries can be turned around from something negative to something constructive, and provide an open and honest foundation from which to move forward.

Back in December, the Special Assembly agreed to beef up the Safeguarding Department and boost its independence.

Director of Operations Ken Swarbrick updated Assembly. So far, they haven’t been able to recruit a Head of Safeguarding, but by the end of next month, there will be 6 executive staff working in the safeguarding department aided by 3.5 admin officers. No one asked why the post was proving difficult to fill or whether there was a timescale for further recruitment.

Last December in the first of two Special Assemblies, ministers discovered that there was a so-called Secret Protocol that was being followed if serious safeguarding complaints were made. Prior to the Special Assembly in December, it hadn’t been shared with ministers. In the most serious of cases, individuals could be required to step back from their roles. A revised protocol has now been agreed by the Assembly which includes timescales and procedures for who needs to be appointed to an Emergency Safeguarding Panel and a reminder that it’s not an investigative body.

No one asked how often the protocol has been used … but it’s understood that the protocol has been used in a handful of cases and people have been asked to step back.

The work of reconfiguration and restructuring continues.

Work to reconfigure how local congregations relate to each other – with linkages between congregations, mergers, and dissolutions or closures planned at a regional Presbytery level began a few years ago and is ongoing. Compared to last year’s General Assembly, this activity has accelerated, but the process has many years to run.

Alongside these changes is the vision to create 10 newly-constituted congregations in addition to 10 new church planting projects over the next 10 years, an initiative with the snappy title of 10+10 in 10.

Speakers rose to ask whether it’s turned into a reconfiguration of buildings and lost sight of the reconfiguration of ministry. Some spoke about how reconfiguration can be positive.

Leaving aside the reconfiguration of congregations, more centrally, a separate General Assembly Structures and Resources Review is ongoing. A long report has been produced which is neither final nor exhaustive, and will now be sent to presbyteries and staff for comment.

Former moderator William Henry explained that this rationalisation is due to “a shortage of ministers and declining numbers and resources”. It’s remit includes finances, buildings, ministerial training and the college, social witness, missional priorities and home and abroad, how presbyteries are organised, and more.

It contains some options but no recommendations, and it was explained that the report is purposefully full of perceptions rather than hard evidence, with delegates and staff pointing out that some of the perceptions are very inaccurate.

Overall the Structures report has the feel of homework that was incomplete but handed in to meet the deadline of the General Assembly meeting. That is a bit harsh, but the reality seems to be that the bandwidth of senior figures needed for the many, many Structures meetings was diverted to the safeguarding work, and with the pressure on staff working around the clock week in week out, nothing more concrete could be produced.

A lot of frustration with the protracted process was expressed – on the floor of the General Assembly and in the corridors and coffee times – that it could go on well beyond 2027. The members of General Assembly expressed that dissatisfaction by supporting an amendment brought by Rev Sam Bostock that forces General Assembly to make a final decision during the next calendar year, either at General Assembly or by convening a Special General Assembly. That his amendment was seconded by Rev Daniel Kane, a convenor of one of the Councils, and supported by a former moderator felt significant.

To give you a flavour of some of the ideas and questions floated in the long report that will be hitting Presbyteries and members of staff’s desks over the summer and in the autumn …

Should PCI stop sending out its own missionaries and instead work with global mission partner organisations (who already send more Presbyterians around the world than the denomination itself)?
Should the training of ministers be devolved to a non-PCI organisation? There was immediate strong pushback on that notion.
If more work is to be devolved to Presbyteries, perhaps the current 19 presbyteries – the largest currently has 3 times the number of congregations than the smallest – should be reshaped into 6-8 or 12-14. Warnings from the platform that bigger does not always equal better.

It continues to be an anxious time for staff who are working against uncertainty of how they fit the denomination’s future priorities. And there are indications throughout the blue book and supplementary reports that PCI has a poor understanding of meaningful consultation and lacks expertise in surveying and measurement.

The finances of the church’s care homes and social care work were discussed in more detail than previous General Assemblies.

For several years, reports in the blue book mentioned the difficult financial situation of the work of the Council for Social Witness without giving a lot of detail. That church council currently run 6 residential care homes, a nursing home, services for addiction rehabilitation, and more. Most of its work is funded by the health and social care trusts.

This year’s council report gave the stark figure that they have now built up over the last three or four years a £3.6million internal overdraft (that’s against an annual £16m turnover). Their report explains that the council had believed their financial situation had almost turned around only to discover it was worse than they thought.

Interim Secretary Caroline Yeomans told the Assembly that some of their services “were developed for a different era” and as a Church organisation “we have not always adapted a quickly as the environment around us has changed”. She spoke of being “thankful that difficult truths are now being faced honestly”.

She spoke about years of rising costs, increasingly complex care needs and policy changes. The printed report highlights that central government fees rise slower than inflation. There has been a heavy reliance on agency staff to fill There was an opportunity for recovery that might include stopping unsustainable work and investing in areas of emerging need. From February this year, new financial recovery plans now are in place.

The Structures report suggests that the work of the Council for Social Witness could be spun out into an arms-length agency of the denomination, become totally autonomous, or sold off. The Council favour the agency approach. The need for a decision may be more urgent than the overall PCI structures review.

Answering a question raised by former moderator Norman Hamilton about other areas the Council for Social Witness could extend its expertise into, David Brice suggested that the church needed to look at streets and develop ministry for homelessness, for people with addiction and who have been through the criminal justice system. Later Norman Hamilton would return to the platform with a wren’s nest in his hand to illustrate his speech about homelessness.

Another area of the church’s work in financial difficulty is the college. Union Theological College continues to run at a deficit and is “projecting to operate at a loss for the foreseeable future”. No one asked how big the (accumulated) deficit was. The Council for Training in Ministry requests for central funding from the denomination’s United Appeal have been rising every year, with the 2027 request 30% more than back in 2023.

Is there a shortage of Presbyterian ministers?

Yes and No.

One of the reports highlighted that there may be a shortage of churches for student ministers finishing their two-year-long assistantships. This is because some vacant congregations are being held back from being allowed to call a new minister until the mergers and linkages are agreed. So in the short term there may be a shortage of churches to apply to. That said, General Assembly was told that ministers are slow to apply to opportunities in the west that have been left unfilled for well over a year.

However, in the medium term, with only 10 or 11 new student ministers entering the college each year, the number of retirements far exceeds the new supply of ministers and there may ultimately be more vacant churches that available ministers. Ministers transferring in from other countries and denominations may help make up the shortfall.

The reason for the college’s financial position was partly put down to unpredictable numbers of students. Having broken away from Queen’s University, their new partnership with St Mary’s University in Twickenham has offered non-ministerial students a BA (Hons) in Theology since September 2022.

Buried in a Structures Review report – but not verbally explained from the platform as part of the Council for Training in Ministry section of business – no further students are being accepted onto that undergraduate course, although students who are already enrolled will be able to finish their degrees.

This year’s Quality Assurance Agency (QAA) annual monitoring report is due to be published any day now and may provide more external insight into that decision.

There was commentary in written reports about the challenge of operating a ‘mini-university’ and managing the regulatory requirements being imposed by the Office for Students in England via the link with St Mary’s.

Former moderator John Kirkpatrick chairs the College Management Committee. He warned members of General Assembly that “as goes the college, so goes the church”, an oblique reference to questions of whether ministerial training could be outsourced. Instead he said the church should “prepare for growth”.

Against the backdrop of the incomplete Structures Review, Rev Prof Michael McClenahan’s three year term as college principal was extended by one year.

NDAs and Compromise Agreements

The December Special Assembly commissioned a task group to write a policy on the use of Compromise Agreements. A two-page document was debated and agreed almost unanimously, although the 380-word Biblical perspective was criticised by some as being too brief.

The official PCI position is now that NDAs will not be used as a matter of course. But they may be considered at the request of the departing employee, or to prevent or reduce further harm, or to protect other parties – like PCI staff – of whom the church has a duty of care. The triumvirate Senior Leadership Team now need to approve their use with legal and HR advice. The General Council will be furnished with an annual anonymised report about the use of Compromise Agreements and NDAs, and will have the power – subject to legal advice – to amend or cancel obligations placed on an employee.

New Clerk

Rev Jonathan Boyd is the new clerk, taking up the post in early July. He’s one of three Jonathan Boyds in the system. So it’s not a sudden rise to fame for the student minister, but instead the minister of Killyleagh congregation. (Acting Clerk David Allen will then become a part-time Assistant Clerk with responsibility for the Reconfiguration of Ministry.)

As agreed at the Special General Assembly in February, the powerful General Council now has two co-convenors, a minister and an elder, with Avril Heenan joining former moderator David Bruce as the line managers of the ‘three Wise Men’ (aka Senior Leadership Team): Clerk, Deputy Clerk and Director of Operations.

Ecumenical matters

Correspondence from one minister has triggered a review of the principles that should underlie PCI’s engagement with ecumenical bodies. A pivotal moment in PCI’s history was its decision to leave the World Council of Churches in 1980. 46 years later, the minister of Trinity congregation in Cork, Rev Richie Cronin, expressed dissatisfaction the World Communion of Reformed Churches’ gender justice policy, and stance on abortion, same-sex marriage, and its theological position on justification.

Former moderator Trevor Morrow rose to tell members of General Assembly that the reformed tradition in Britain and Ireland is traditionally ‘big tent’ theologically, while US Presbyterianism tends towards separatism. He suggested some people were receiving their reformed theology from the US. Richie Cronin countered that he was not a separatist and would like “like to stay and fight”.

Public Affairs

Convenor of the Council for Public Affairs, Rev Daniel Kane said that the denomination was not trying to “be known for winning culture wars” but wanted to be known “for advancing morally serious and human theology” as society faces up to big issues.

He said the church needed to move wider than the old hackneyed issues of human sexuality, abortion etc. “We need not to be seen for what we’re against, but be seen for what we’re for.”

Commenting on the Department of Finance’s Marriage and Civil Partnership Bill that has reached Committee Stage, Daniel Kane suggested that giving legal recognition to non-religious belief marriages – like humanist ceremonies – should not “facilitate eccentric or frivolous” ceremonies and said that the church was “opposed to marriage ceremonies being offered on a for-profit basis”. Given that consensual sexual activity is legal from the age of 16, and sex belonged within marriage, he said it was illogical of the bill to raise the minimum age of marriage from 16 to 18, provided safeguards were in place.

The church’s response to Violence Against Women and Girls was raised once from the platform.

Christian Aid

Questions were raised at last June’s General Assembly about the LGBT position taken in a report published by the Great Britain wing of Christian Aid. After spending considerable time debating it, the denomination’s Christmas World Development Appeal, a fundraiser traditionally split evenly between Tear Fund and Christian Aid (and a small amount for other projects) was altered to give congregations the option of not funding one of the charities.

While the verbal reports didn’t highlight it, the printed report of the Council for Global Mission notes that only 15 of the 500+ congregations asked for their contributions to go to Tear Fund alone, and one congregation even requested that all of their donations go to Christian Aid. Just about 3.5% of the £0.5m appeal was affected.

The science of climate change was challenged

A resolution in support of last September’s Stewardship of Creation conference went to a standing card vote late on Friday afternoon. Two speakers questioned what they perceived as a lack of alternative opinions on the science of human-induced climate change at the event. Though the organiser said the conference was primarily about unpacking what the Bible said about the issue rather than articulating the science. Several speakers expressed their dissatisfaction. A vote on the resolution eventually passed 64 to 50. But climate change is still a topic of debate among a significant minority of ministers and representative elders.

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General Assembly returns on Tuesday 15 June next year. In the meantime, the restriction on serving alcohol in Assembly Buildings has been varied so the Anglican Consultative Council can serve alcoholic wine at Eucharist services when they meet in Belfast between 27 June 2026 and 5 July 2026!

Derren Brown: Only Human – combining magic, misdirection and mentalism to great effect (Grand Opera House until Saturday 23 May)

2026-05-20T00:28:25.107+01:00

The audience are quickly integrated into the running of the Derren Brown: Only Human show. And we stay involved right to the finish. The underlying techniques that the skilled storyteller and hustler claims to be employing – never mind the ones that he’s actually using to obtain the wowing results – vary across the different beats of the production.

Everyone attending – and specifically reviewers – are asked not to reveal the details of the almost fully sold-out show. But it’s safe to say that there will be demonstrations of the full suite of mentalism (suggestion, perception, psychology and hypnosis), close magic and the manipulation of objects, misdirection, and large-scale illusion which may put a relatively simple trick at the heart of something so theatrical that it feels immense. There’s lots of live camera work to pick out people in the audience – sitting up in the Gods doesn’t preclude you being called down onto the stage or given a mic to share your input.

Brown is warm and affable. Volunteers – if anyone can truly show freewill in an environment that so carefully controls certain aspects of our experience – all seem very comfortable. Walking up Great Victoria Street after the show, I bumped into one of the early on-stage volunteers carrying his ‘prize’ and he was thrilled with his evening.

Learning to ask the right questions was the theme of local magician Caolan McBride’s impressive Unlocking Sherlock show last October. With a focus on how we relate to the future, the “Only Human” title is loosely referred to during Brown’s two-hour 40-minute show – plan your return travel arrangements accordingly as some of tonight’s audience members hadn’t correctly predicted their exit time! – he keeps returning to another question: “What do you want to be?”

The historical figure of Nostradamus provides a vehicle for a set of in-show predictions which build up and extend throughout the full duration of the performance. Overthinkers like me will spot clues and develop hunches about how some of the illusions might be achieved. But by the time we’ve reached the grand finale, the combination of what seem like huge coincidences and the arms-length nature of one of the final numerical tricks defy easy explanation, and any suggestion that the coherence of the show’s theme didn’t always land is mostly replaced with a sense of wonder that Brown and his expert team can keep the myriad of plates spinning to pull off such a series of big reveals.

(Overthinkers may later want to question the assumptions that are re-enforced at intervals throughout the show to unpick how some of the illusions are achieved. However, the people who’ll get the best sense of what’s truly going on will be the theatre’s ushers who will see the same elements of the show repeated – and probably adapted to go with the flow of audience responses – throughout the week. But they’ll also be keeping tight lipped about their observations! Most people seem happy to sit back, relax and soak it all in and be wowed.)

Derren Brown: Only Human continues at the Grand Opera House until Saturday 23 May before heading off to Plymouth, Birmingham, Edinburgh, and more … ending up in the Apollo Theatre in London’s West End for three and a half months from 10 October.

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Hen – fresh and feathery perspective on a familiar human crisis (Queen’s Film Theatre from Friday 22 May)

2026-05-18T16:13:31.949+01:00

Over the weekend, I had to watch To Kill A Mockingbird in preparation for the recording of an upcoming episode of Banterflix. Harper Lee’s novel wasn’t part of my GCSE English Literature experience: Laurie Lee’s Cider with Rosie was the book we had to study. Like the original 1960 book, the 1962 film adaptation examines racial injustice in the American South through the eyes of a child. The mixture of naïve and old-beyond-her-years observation feels fresher than any adult procedural storytelling could have managed.

Reacting to the constraints on his normal mode of filmmaking in his home country of Hungary, György Pálfi’s new film Hen uses the perspective of a chicken. Born and reared in a factory farm environment, the unnamed avian escapologist takes advantage of an opportunity to flee from a lorry transporting hens to the next, likely final, stage of their journey from egg to plate. It’s the first of many breakouts, as the leghorn hen travels to her new home where she ‘flies the coop’ to explore the surroundings of a family-owned restaurant on the Greek coast.

Business isn’t good and the owner’s daughter’s boyfriend decides to diversify their income with people smuggling. Despite the feathery perspective, Pálfi boldly makes the hen complicit in events that will shock but not surprise audiences.

The lead role is played by eight chickens: Anett, Enci, Enikő, Eszti, Eti, Feri, Nóra and Szandi. You can find out more about their jumping and running skills in a Guardian interview with Pálfi. The performance of the hens on screen are always real, never CGIed, though their human handler is magicked out of some footage.

What starts out as an almost flippant film about factory farming, switches to tell a somewhat familiar tale of human trafficking. A novel depiction, but hardly a new story? Yet the fresh perspective remains vivid in my mind days after the preview screening.

The tale of a hen determined to break free from her own captors, who stows away and witnesses terrible things along her journey. The parallels are subtle yet significant with the hopes and experiences of the people we briefly see being moved around ‘like animals’.

Hen is being screened in Queen’s Film Theatre from Friday 22 May.

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Guys and Dolls – agile gamblers with varying degrees of situationships are confronted with the error of their ways in this infectious musical (Belfast Operatic Company at Grand Opera House until Saturday 16 May)

2026-05-13T20:11:29.582+01:00

Nathan is running an nomadic crap game under the nose of the local cop and in spite of a warning from his long suffering fiancée of 14 years, nightclub dancer Adelaide. To raise enough money to secure a new venue, he bets master gambler Sky Masterson $1,000 that he can’t take a local Save-A-Soul Mission worker Sergeant Sarah on a same-day dinner date to Havana. The odds are stacked in his favour, but does anything ever run smoothly for Nathan?

Despite the appearance of a gun on stage, Guys and Dolls is a musical comedy that swerves all opportunities to become a heart-wrenching noir story of tragic loss. Jo Swerling and Abe Burrows’ book with lyrics and music by Frank Loesser is set in early 1950’s New York.

A gang of gamblers view all women as ‘dolls’. The women show their smarts and view the gambling, misogynistic guys with varying degrees of distain. Spoiler alert: Sarah’s spiritual battle with the gamblers in “this jungle of sin” ultimately leads the men through a pleasingly theologically sound process of examining their consciences, confession, redemption and ultimately restoration!

76 years after the show’s Broadway première, Belfast Operatic Company’s ambitious production swims in a sea of talent. The whole company look at home on the stage and ooze enthusiasm and a sense of joy. The chemistry between the potential love interest’s is natural. Dessie Havlin’s confident swagger and tenor voice as charismatic Sky are well matched by Naomi Smyth’s all-round performance as Sarah (and her terrifically trolleyed introduction to rum), with their gorgeous duet I’ve Never Been in Love Before a fabulous way to round off act one.

Greg Fox brings humour, exasperation and pleading to his portrayal of larger-than-life Nathan. Emiko Seawright swings the put-upon artiste Adelaide between hope and exasperation, with starry singing and dancing in A Bushel and a Peck and the playful Take Back your Mink. Adelaide’s only duet with fellow situationship victim Sarah, Marry the Man Today, beautifully blends the voices of Seawright and Smyth. Kudos to Conor Anderson who animates the character Nicely Nicely and ably leads the jubilant 11 o’clock number Sit Down, You’re Rockin’ The Boat. Salvation Army member and Belfast Operatic/St Agnes’ stalwart, Laura Kerr, plays the stern-until-she’s-flexible General Cartwright with gusto ... hopefully not based on anyone she’s met in church!

Guys and Dolls is a long show, running just shy of three hours including the interval, which seemed to catch out some first night audience members (who shuffled towards the theatre’s exits to catch last buses and trains before the second act was even close to finishing). Despite the run time that must have put pressure on rehearsals, director Kerry Rodgers delivers a well-drilled cast who felt like they’re mid-way through a month long run rather than the first of six shows.

The 20-strong orchestra in the pit under Colin Scott’s baton crank out toe-tapping tune after infectious tune, although the meaty second act entr’acte (blame the composer!) almost causes, rather than prevents, audience restlessness with a desire to quickly get back to the on-stage madness.

I can’t think of many amateur groups who could deliver the all-male Luck Be A Lady song and dance routine with such aplomb and nimble footwork. The dice-heavy set design and flamboyant costumes – the guys’ rainbow suits are a triumph of the second act – reinforce the frivolity of the plot. Tim Bell’s ambitious choreography impresses throughout, whether bringing the Hot Box dancers to life, or creating the visually pleasing Havana routine as Sky and Sarah mingle with the carousing street party. The vivid lighting design adds height and movement to scenes, though on opening night left some characters performing in the relative shadow.

Guys and Dolls continues its impressive run at the Grand Opera House until Saturday 16 May.

Photo credit: unknown

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Tea In A China Cup – getting out the good china from 1983 for a fresh brew (Lyric Theatre until Saturday 30 May)

2026-05-09T21:50:00.004+01:00

As part of the Lyric Theatre’s 75th anniversary programme, Christina Reid’s 1983 play Tea in a China Cup is being restaged. Back then she was the theatre’s playwright-in-residence (1983/4) and one of just four female playwrights to have their work produced by the Lyric during the 1980s. One of just four women playwrights in a decade!

Tea In A China Cup is a play about working-class Ulster Protestant women penned by a working-class Ulster Protestant woman who lived in Ardoyne. To borrow from one of the script’s recurring themes, it’s as if the play has been trapped in one of the wooden cabinets with glass shelves dotted around the walls of the Lyric Theatre’s public areas, like the ‘best’ china tea set that no one uses. And more than 40 years later, someone has had the nerve to open the door and lift out a cup and saucer.

This is a play full of sorrow that follows three generations of women in a family. History repeats itself with dangerous military service (across world wars and the Troubles), husbands with little respect for their wives, and a strong sense that the first rule of Protestant club is to never let yourself down in front of other people.

Everything is viewed through the eyes of Beth. When she’s not in the heart of a scene, Amy Molloy lurks to the side, either crouched down or peering down on the action from high up on the multi-storey set. Poverty has constrained Beth’s education along with her wider family’s social mobility. It’s easy to forget that the play is set in North Down rather than north Belfast. Perhaps true to her own Ardoyne environs, Reid writes in a best friend for Beth, Catholic girl Theresa (Louise Parker), who seems to have the best of everything, but who we will discover ultimately also lives under her own family’s omertà and suppresses her actual circumstances when back home from London.

Beth was apparently born asking ‘why?’ and as her character matures, Molloy finds new ways to question difference and physically react to the hypocrisy around her and the perennial absence of fulsome answers. Will she ever find relief from the burden of carrying around everyone else’s past lives? Again, an attitude that will have seemed more novel and x in 1983 than 2026.

The play’s narrative crashes together flashbacks like a script dropped on the floor with its pages picked up in a random order. In the present, Mum Sarah (a brilliant Mary Moulds) is facing the final months of her life with great fortitude. With effort she moves from her bed to a window to watch the bands go past on the Twelfth. Director Dan Gordon starred in the 1983 production. His decades-long work with bands brings the authentic sound of Mourne Young Defenders Flute Band into Chris Warner’s vivid soundscape. (The Lyric’s spatial audio system is put to good use throughout, though the sound of cars going past being placed above the audience’s heads felt jarring.)

Marie Jones has a twinkle in her eye playing Beth’s grandmother, with some great conspiratorial scenes shared with Great Aunt Maisie (Katie Tumelty). The remainder of the cast play family members, council workers and neighbours. Maria Connolly sets a flippant tone as a cemetery department clerk with a bouffant hairdo and a comedy-sized magnifying glass. She later garners more laughs as a costly fortune teller.

One generation’s loss during a world war is followed by the next’s loss of homes as the Troubles begin. Simon Sweeney sympathetically portrays two generations of young men heading away to army training – cherished figures with pride of place on the wall of the family home – with the first departure particularly touching. John Paul Connolly is the more trouble-than-he’s-worth grandfather, while Matthew Forsythe appears in a number of roles including a British Army officer struggling to protect homes under threat.

Ciarán Bagnall’s spinning and sliding set and lighting design cast vivid slabs of light through open doorways in dark building with the cast needing to take care to hit their mark precisely to keep their faces illuminated in the narrow beams. The homes on either side of the stage neatly rotate, revealing perilous ladders that that put your heart in your mouth as you watch cast members clamber up and down. (The forced perspective works well, though I almost expect Scrooge from the Lyric’s recent festive productions to step through at any moment.)

Death rituals and lousy sex education are familiar topics in modern theatre. Shame may still be a driving force in families, but is secrecy still as prevalent? Tea In A China Cup often feels like a play of its time. What producer today would entertain commissioning a play with such a large cast (nine)? Yet its restaging is a much-needed reminder that women are still under-represented in almost every aspect of Irish theatre (except costume design), but will contribute so much when not actively frozen out.

If she was allowed to break the fourth wall, Beth might ask why this play was chosen from the archives to be revamped and presented to fresh audiences? A women-led story on a Belfast stage is almost as unusual then as it is now: Cuckoo-Land is a recent exception. When first staged, the brazen and unfiltered anti-Catholic bigoted utterances of the main characters must have been shocking and almost fearless. But what about today? How much has changed? Those lines of dialogue – sometimes funny, sometimes almost too crass to be comfortable – are a reminder of how far society has come. Sectarianism is by no means dead, but it’s much diluted and has largely moved beyond simple beliefs that people from the ‘other side’ are lazy and don’t have good personal hygiene. Yet communities are still apt to be swayed by fear and difference over hope and cohesion.

Tea In A China Cup continues its run at the Lyric Theatre until Saturday 30 May.

Photo Credit: Neil Harrison

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The Bodyguard – high production values but emotionally light adaptation of classic film (Grand Opera House until Saturday 9 May)

2026-05-06T01:28:00.000+01:00

The spirit of Whitney Houston is much less pronounced in this latest UK touring version of The Bodyguard musical (based on the 1992 film) directed by Thea Sharrock. There’s no attempt to recreate Houston’s legendary vocals, and instead the Houston’s back catalogue is explored and reimagined through the eyes and experience of fictional singer Rachel Marron.

Former Secret Service agent turned bodyguard Frank Farmer has been hired to protect Oscar-nominated power balladeer Rachel after she received a series of threats. His no nonsense hyper vigilant approach soon rubs Rachel and her entire entourage up the wrong way. Only her young son Fletcher is on Team Frank. But the tension melts away between Rachel and Frank after a risky club gig goes south and the pair bond over karaoke.

The Bodyguard breaks a lot of the normal rules of jukebox musical theatre. The build-up of tension trades on the fact that the audience are often kept well ahead of the characters. One scene late in the show is a case in point with some in the audience practically shouting to warn the cast about an emerging threat. In complete contrast, there are also moments when large bangs and flames startle the audience. (The appearance of a man wearing a balaclava feels like it’s going to be so much more sinister in Belfast than some English cities.)

Jukebox musicals also tend to rely on a central set that forms the backdrop for nearly every scene. The Bodyguard’s set designer Tim Hatley instead uses floor to ceiling curtains to (visually pleasingly) section off parts of the stage and create windows into rooms in Rachel’s mansion. Scene changes are achieved with elaborate yet elegant automation. The lighting design (Mark Henderson) slowly reveals its depth and tricks over the first ten minutes. Video projection (Duncan McLean) hints at production’s cinematic heritage and also helps immerse the audience in the second act build-up to the Academy Award ceremony.

Tonally, the regular appearance of big musical numbers drives the energy in so many scenes that moments of extended conversation feel neglected. The stage musical plays up older sister Nicki’s jealousy about Rachel’s success, but the revelation about her character turns out to be very different to the movie.

Greatest Love of All is the first song that properly showcases Sidone Smith’s voice (playing Rachel). During the sisters’ duets, Sasha Monique’s vocals (Nicki) tend to shine out ahead of Smith, and her performance of Saving All My Love For You is a low-key but standout moment in the first act.

It’s two and a half years since a previous production of The Bodyguard toured through Belfast (reviewed back in September 2023). This time around, Frank’s initially diabolical karaoke performance isn’t allowed to improve in the second verse of I Will Always Love You, and we never get to hear Adam Garcia properly sing (not even in the final extravagant curtain call).

Overall, The Bodyguard fails to capture the strident emotion of the film. A death after the interval evokes a strong sense of peril but strangely the characters don’t emote significant sadness. Smith/Rachel’s final rendition of I Will Always Love You recreates the musicality of the classic Houston’s version (of Dolly Parton’s song), with a tender a cappella beginning, building up to the powerful middle section and the iconic key changes. The remote cabin singalong of Jesus Loves Me is the first real moment that the normally vocal Belfast audience start to join in, accompanied by the unwelcome sound of text message notifications across the auditorium.

The Bodyguard continues its run at the Grand Opera House until Saturday 9 May.

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Trojans – epic yet contemporary themes explored with a choreography that creates an intimate connection with the audience (Luail at Island Arts Centre)

2026-05-04T14:09:00.001+01:00

The last time I saw work by Luail, their inaugural show occupied the full width of the Lyric’s main stage. Last week, the experience was much more intimate with Luail’s revival of Philip Connaughton’s Trojans asking the audience to share the stage with the talented ensemble for portions of the 70-minute performance.

A huge cube built from trussing occupied the main hall in Lisburn’s Island Arts Centre. Elevated screens requested (but insist they did not ‘order’) the audience to mill around. The dancers crawled out. Soon, we were encouraged to circulate and inspect the now upright and static performers before they began to move once more.

Inspired by Virgil’s The Aeneid, death is quickly introduced. Followed by themes of isolation, displacement, migration, war, and kowtowing to figures in power. Unspoken questions are raised about why no one intervenes or even offers comfort when someone falls. Fear? Self-preservation? Survival of the fittest?

Once the day-glo orange netting is removed from the row of seats on each side of the square stage, we rested … for a while. The netting hints at dangerous sea journeys and becoming trapped in other people’s fights. More audience movement was invited, as no one should ever get too comfortable or relaxed when they’re not in control of their destiny. Death returned at the end of the performance, and this time the audience had been sufficiently coached to join the cast and become part of the story as the screens asked: “Would you be willing to die for the greater good?”

Veteran (and iconic) dancer Joanna Banks strutted around the stage, embodying a quiet sense of absolute power and authority. Playing Juno – queen of the gods and hater of the Trojans – she was seated at ever-increasing heights above contradiction in structures created by Robyn Byrne, Jou-Hsin Chu, Clara Kerr, Sean Lammer, Tom O’Gorman, Hamza Pirimo, Rosie Stebbing and Meghan Stevens.

Like last May’s Chora, the company’s keen sense of space was once again on display, moving at frantic speed across the enclosed stage without clipping other performers. There was a strong sense of trust with backward falls into unseen arms, and a rather beautiful moment as one dancer climbed a hill of human bodies with theh path ahead not fully clear. Emily Ní Bhroin earth-coloured costumes grounded the performance. Luca Truffarelli’s video work triggered scene changes in the audience’s minds with sea, fire and a vista of destroyed buildings. Oberman Knocks’ electronic soundscape was intense: earplugs are handed out to everyone on entry, just in case.

The self-contained set dominated the otherwise naked volume of the Lisburn theatre hall. The production was big and bold, yet intense and intimate. Trojans once again demonstrates the skill of the full time Luail company members, this time up close and very personal, with the audience asked to look into the performers’ eyes. Virgil’s study of violence and conflict and Aeneas’ difficult migration journey still speaks loudly into today’s world, and Luail’s revival of Trojans demonstrates how dance as an artform can be intimate rather than distant, and engender emotion and reflect world affairs in a 10m x 10m stage and not just create a spectacle at a distance.

Trojans finished its tour (Dublin, Galway and Lisburn) on Thursday 30 April.

Photo credit: Luca Truffarelli

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Cuckoo-Land – rage, reason and realpolitik in this punk exploration of the NI Women’s Coalition (Kabosh and The MAC until 26 April)

2026-04-18T00:43:00.004+01:00

It was a pretty punk move to wheel an electoral trojan horse onto the ballot paper and contest the 1996 Northern Ireland Forum elections knowing that two seats were within realistic reach. Amid a sea of majority male candidates and male politicians, the Northern Ireland Women’s Coalition gathered up supporters, firmed up policy positions, and stood candidates across multiple constituencies, coming out of the election count as the nineth largest party, qualifying to have two candidates elected from their regional list under the provision to make sure minor parties were represented at the talks.

The women were accused by leading politicians – multiple times – of living in “cuckoo-land”. That insult is picked up as the name of Kabosh’s new musical play Cuckoo-Land which documents the forming and storming stages of the NI Women’s Coalition. Accompanied by the punchy sound and lyrics of punk songs written by Katie Richardson, playwright Vittoria Caffola stylishly introduces the audience to the some of the key players who reluctantly but assertively stepped into the political arena to make a difference.

Back in 2023, Owen McCafferty’s much-lauded play Agreement (with the script shaped by director Charlotte Westenra’s years of research) relegated the smaller parties in the 1998 talks process to a throwaway line. A few months later, The Man Who Swallowed A Dictionary was staged on the same Lyric stage, a companion piece that examined the life and legacy of loyalist and PUP leader David Ervine.

Finally, in 2026, in the month of the 30th anniversary of its creation, the NIWC story is being told. And it’s a story of energy, passion and commitment. Women who felt that they were invisible in the mainstream parties and did something about it.

The characters deployed demonstrate the class and ideological divisions amongst the group far better than the media I remember being glued to at the tie. They’re not all from south Belfast. They’re not all in violent agreement. But they do all want to see radical changes in representation, consultation and delivery. Monica (McWilliams) is an academic and activist (played by Orla Gormley). Bronagh (Hinds) is the organised strategist: her spirit and approach is so well captured by Orla Mullan! Pearl (Sager) is an east Belfast protestant who brings the voice of victims to the table and can quickly seal deals while outside with smokers from other parties (Caroline Curran). May (Blood) drives everything from behind the drumkit (Allison Harding) as one person sagely commented after the show. Christine Nelson and Maeve Byrne complete the cast playing Avila (Kilmurray) and Anne (McCann).

They’re a mere cross section of the 70+ women who got involved and stood for election. The full set of individuals are honoured, their names read out in a neat roll call and projected on the set’s backdrop. Later, Fergus Wachala-Kelly’s cartoon graphics will project dinosaurs over the wall full of clipboards, and make little clenched fists appear in the clipboards as if they were individual screens or windows.

Mary Tumelty’s lighting design includes fixtures found at concerts. They underscore Cheylene Murphy’s thumping bass line and Jackie Rainey’s electric guitar. Richardson’s lyrics riff off dinosaur metaphors, finding power, and “not hiding my crazy”. The melodies are catchy: the words resonate with the characters’ dialogue.

Soon a list of shared principles has been fashioned, including affordable childcare … stated with a knowing nod to the audience to indicate that the work started by the NIWC has yet to be finished. There is recurring pressure to take a stand on the border issue: not taking a public stand is viewed by some potential allies as taking a stand. Staying neutral shrank the size Coalition’s working group but maximised their pool of potential voters. Later, in the days and hours leading up to Good Friday 1998, the pressure to horse-trade priorities to secure some concrete results challenges their principles and dearly held policies.

It’s not all serious. There’s a fun sequence about Monica’s unorthodox sourcing of a loudhailer, and Christina Reid gets more than her share of witty retorts. Director Paula McFetridge brings politicians from other parties – mostly men – onto the stage as oversized grey heads held up on sticks. Their verbatim dialogue is disparaging of the NIWC members and their aims. What starts out as a jokey way of depicting David Trimble, Seamus Mallon, Peter Robinson, Iris Robinson (who labels the NIWC as “part of the pan-nationalist front”), Jeffrey Donaldson, David McNarry and David Ervine (who would only later begin to challenge misogyny) turns serious when an extended exchange from the Forum is replayed, word for word, attacking and demeaning the participation of the Coalition.

As the 100-minute interval-less performance reaches its climax, the appearance of Mo Mowlan ups the level emotion on the stage, and then an unforced comment about violence against women and girls – one of the Coalition’s original priorities to tackle – rips right through the historical revelry into today’s reality.

The marriage of music and dialogue through the medium of punk turns out to be apt. Cuckoo-Land goes where other playwrights have steered clear. It’s a riot to watch, realistic in its depiction of how politics and perfection are poor bedfellows, and the infectious enjoyment of the cast and crew seep out into the appreciative audience.

Cuckoo-Land continues in The MAC until Sunday 26 April.

Photo credit: Carrie Davenport

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A Bomber’s Moon – bombs, babies and barbarianism in the name of God (Bright Umbrella at The Sanctuary Theatre until Saturday 2 May)

2026-04-16T15:06:00.007+01:00

It’s 1941. Sadie Murray – ‘Minty’ to her friends – is employed in the Ropeworks. Her boyfriend has a safe job working as RAF ground crew. But when he belated tells her that he’s signed up to fly, she isn’t sure when or whether she wants to see her Frank again. Soon the Belfast Blitz will change everything when Minty is caught in a raid and a frisky ‘Free State fireman’ enters the burning building to rescue her.

A Bomber’s Moon is a new play by Sam Robinson and Trevor Gill being staged in The Sanctuary Theatre at the bottom of the bottom of Castlereagh Street in the old Mountpottinger Non-Subscribing Presbyterian Church.

Leah Williamson ably brings the central character of Minty to life. Twenty years old, Minty is a sweary chatterbox who tells stories with her eyes, a woman who is a good judge of character, unafraid to stand up to men when she’s scorned, yet has a complete blind spot for her mission hall preaching father. Williamson anchors the plot, thrillingly delivers some of the playwrights’ funniest lines, and skilfully uses variations in physicality to distinguish how Minty warms to the men in her life.

Andy Porter plays the complex character of Jamesy Murray. A firebrand, Catholicism-hating preacher by day suffering from WW1 shell shock, but a more sinister figure at night who keeps a firearm in a biscuit tin and skulks around the east Belfast streets exacting justice and leading men into violence. A deadly mix of pseudo-religious fanatical ideology. Porter allows Jamesy’s character to simmer for much of the play before exploding in the middle of the second act with a well-choreographed fight scene.

The Murray’s front room sits to one side of the stage (complete with porcelain dogs), opposite the air raid shelter which Minty and her fella enjoy escaping to. Glenn McGivern plays Frank Warnock, a young man who is confident about what he wants and pushes forward before thinking … deserving the many slaps Minty/Williamson doles out! McGivern later returns as another character to powerfully call time on Jamey’s rein of terror.

John Travers completes the cast, playing the aforementioned Drogheda fireman, Sean O’Connor, who brings a brief snatch of tranquillity to Minty’s chaotic life. Travers revels in balancing cheekiness with tripping over northern sensibilities and the vocabulary differences that divide the pair’s backgrounds.

Sue Lawley’s voice unexpected pops up as the voice of the radio news reader.

Sam Robinson has a knack of bringing social history to life. There’s a thrill seeing his work performed in the heart of the area he’s writing about, earthed to the streets and places he liberally mentions in the script, connecting people with the lives of previous generations. He avoids the trap – that other’s don’t always swerve – of sugar-coating the history. Robinson is unafraid to include unvarnished truths, bust some myths, and explore the wider context.

85 years on, Robinson and co-writer/director Gill tell a tale of destruction amid two overlapping conflicts, prejudice, discrimination, hypocrisy, gangsterism and the pain of latent love. The casting is superb, and the simple set more than adequate for the locations the story visits.

The first half is full of fun – Minty’s retelling of the tale of ‘the Ballykinler turd’ just one hilarious highlight – while the mood descends into a deep darkness after the interval. Robinson and Gill squeeze a lot into the story and some scenes could definitely be trimmed or even dropped, particularly in the baggy second act whose step-by-step narrative narrative dilutes the underlying drama and an audience’s ability to fill in missing gaps.

A Bomber’s Moon runs in The Sanctuary Theatre until Sunday 19 April (currently a few tickets remain for Saturday’s matinee), with three additional performances to meet demand now scheduled on Friday 1 and Saturday 2 May. If you pop along, watch out for the immersive bar beforehand as the front of house team take you back to the 1940s.

Photo credit: Melissa Gordon/Gorgeous Photography NI

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Anything Goes – nautical nuptials nixed by true love (St Agnes’ Choral Society in Grand Opera House until Saturday 18 April)

2026-04-15T12:03:00.000+01:00

With music and lyrics by Cole Porter and PG Woodhouse amongst the team writing the book, Anything Goes is a sea of madcap twists and witty dialogue. After months of rehearsals, the volunteer cast and backstage crew at St Agnes’ Choral Society are taking Grand Opera House audiences on a nautical adventure that makes a song and dance out of a set of stormy relationships.

Unbeknownst to his boss, Billy Crocker (Allen Gordon) stows away on board the SS America cruise liner in pursuit of a girl he encountered on a one-night stand. A string of new assumed identities and disguises dig an ever-deeper hole that threatens to drown him as he pours out his heart to on-board entertainer Reno Sweeney (Lorraine Jackson), cuts deals with gangsters Erma (Aoiffe White) and Moonface Martin (Martin McDowell), dodges Elisha J Whitney (Paul Maguire) and tries to win over the heart of an English Earl’s fiancée Hope Harcourt (Aideen Fox).

While most of the 1930’s racist sensibilities of the original musical have been papered over with much-needed character changes – really only the song The Gypsy in Me remains – the ensemble have great fun with the period costumes, dancing with mops, carrying around handbag-sized dog props, briefly breaking the fourth wall, and adorning the two-storey set with 50 cast members for the show’s biggest numbers.

Gordon’s smooth baritone voice melds well with Jackson’s mezzo in Billy and Reno’s solid duet You’re the Top. The sailor quartet – Rhys Devlin, Neal Mullan, Ben Davidson and James Hyde – show off their musical talent (almost barber shop) in There’ll Always Be a Lady Fair. (Their rich vocals pleasingly appear again later in the show during All Through The Night.) There are a couple of dance-heavy songs with scant lyrical relief on either side of the interval: Ann Marie Morgan’s energetic choreography is at its strongest in the elongated tap sequences in the song Anything Goes.

Jackson wears a different costume every time she walks on stage. This extravagance is well worth the extended wardrobe rail and busy quick changes as it builds up Reno’s sense of showmanship and pays off in the second act when Blow, Gabriel, Blow brings the house down with fabulous vocals and a very flashy ensemble dance routine. Musical director Adam Darcy gets a big brassy sound from the 12-piece band in the pit and the cast’s singing is consistently excellent, with Fox, Sweeney and Gordon never not thrilling to listen to.

Laura Kerr’s direction of this sea-bound fantasy leans into the farce. Some of the slapstick elements and the dialogue’s zingers will land better as the show’s timings tighten up during the short run. Two smutty innuendos that jar could helpfully be dropped. The story finishes strongly with a triple wedding, although a quick repeated verse of the finale after the somewhat flat curtain call could have left the audience walking out on a real high. (More modern musical scores always spoil audiences with once last medley.)

Over recent years, St Agnes’ Choral Society’s ambitions have seen them take on and conquer big musical beasts like Shrek, The Addams Family, Calamity Jane, and last year’s staggeringly good Come From Away (which matched or maybe even bettered the UK touring production). The best tunes of Anything Goes have survived longer and stronger in the cultural consciousness than the musical’s plot. But St Agnes’ have applied the same dedication and graft to bring the 92-year-old show to life.

Anything Goes continues in Grand Opera House until Saturday 18 April.

Photo credit: Nicola McKee

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Call to Adventure: The life and times of Francis Maginn – a tale of historical language injustice which still resonates today (c21 Theatre on tour)

2026-04-10T13:28:00.012+01:00

Paperwork and files from a building are being cleared. The boss is not impressed when he discovers a woman hoking through the kerbside skip recovering items. The papers and photographs relate to the work of Francis Maginn, a missionary and teacher who became deaf due to scarlet fever aged five. What starts out as an unfriendly tussle opens out into a conversation that opens his eyes and his ears to a fascinating piece of largely hidden history.

Call to Adventure: The life and times of Francis Maginn tells the story of a deaf man who fought for sign language to be recognised and valued in Britain and Ireland. Sign language was banned from schools at the 1880 Milan Congress in favour of – to use the now-outdated vocabulary of the time – “deaf and deaf mute people” using “pure oralism”. Maginn realises that “the suppression of sign teaches deceit” and doesn’t not make the valuable way of communicating go away.

The story follows Maginn as he bounces between Britain, Ireland, America and France. His experiences lead to lobbying and he proposes the creation of the British Deaf And Dumb Association … and is suitably appalled when a hearing man is appointed as the first chair. Along the way, Alexander Graham Bell’s work to promote oralism is critiqued: the inventor of the telephone’s mother was deaf and his wife lost her hearing as a child due to scarlet fever. Yet Bell feared that deaf people socialising together and marrying each other would breed a “deaf race”, something that would be less likely if communication was always spoken and never signed.

Directors Stephen Kelly and Lisa Kelly give the biographical story plenty of heart, and while some conversations necessarily require performers to face the audience so their signing is visible, the death of a close friend of Maginn’s is delivered by the cast as an emotionally impactful moment. Mark Revels-Barker’s set transforms the yellow skip from the opening scene into many different locations.

Supported by Paula Clarke and Eoghan Lamb who multi-role throughout the one-act play, Jamie Rea very ably plays Maginn, conveying the warmth and perseverance of the central character. The cast confidently switch between roles and languages.

Maginn believed that the deaf community should be “free to communicate not conform”. c21 Theatre’s production embodies those values with an ambitious performance that makes the telling of its story equally accessible for deaf and hearing audiences. There’s a beautiful balance to how the script by Charis McRoberts and Paula Clarke is brought to life. A mix of speech, signing (mostly by the characters, though Seamus Henry steps on stage at various points to interpret some speeches), voiceovers, projected subtitles and gestures make sure that everyone can follow what’s happening.

Call to Adventure is a timely history lesson and story of fighting injustice to share while the Northern Ireland Assembly is currently examining the Sign Language Bill. (The bill completed its consideration stage just before the Assembly broke for Easter.)

I attended the packed opening night performance in the Lyric Theatre and was back in the same venue watching a different show the following evening. It was heart-warming on both evenings to see the c21 Theatre audience spilling out into the theatre foyer and bar, with as many silent signed conversations happening as spoken ones.

Call to Adventure’s handling of language reminded me of two older theatre experiences (which were less accessible but still enjoyable). Aisling Ghéar’s production of Dave Duggan’s play Makaronik (reviewed) in the 2014 Belfast Festival was performed with three quarters of its dialogue in Irish, the rest in English and Empirish (a language made up by the playwright with its roots in Orwell’s Newspeak/1984 and pidgin English). Knowing Irish would have made the storytelling much richer, but the brief explanatory surtitles kept the story flowing. And back in 2018, I watched a Serbian play with Macedonia surtitles based on a Danish film with zero English in a North Macedonian international theatre festival. Not everything happening on the stage is about the words: otherwise it would just be visualised radio!

c21’s commitment to telling high quality stories that include a diverse range of characters through highly accessible performances is to be applauded. Audiences will watch opera performed in its original language. So why not plays that are signed? Hopefully their work along with a small number of other local theatre companies will boost the number of playwrights, actors, directors and creatives from the deaf community making work on Northern Ireland stages and beyond.

Call to Adventure: The life and times of Francis Maginn is currently touring through Courtyard Theatre, Newtownabbey (Friday 10 April), Market Place Theatre, Armagh (Thursday 30), Island Arts Centre, Lisburn (Friday 1 May) and Down Arts Centre (Saturday 2 May).

Photo credit: Neil Harrison Photography

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Midwinter Break – an overly gentle exploration of exile and trauma (Queen’s Film Theatre from Friday 20 March)

2026-03-18T12:53:00.048+00:00

A pregnant woman was caught up in gunfire during the Troubles in what she euphemistically refers to as “as accident” in Belfast. Her baby was saved, but the not-long-married couple quickly quit Northern Ireland for a safer life in Scotland. This cinematic adaptation of Bernard MacLaverty’s novel Midwinter Break catches up Stella (Lesley Manville) and Gerry (Ciarán Hinds) in later life as they head off on a citybreak to Amsterdam and finally confront each other’s needs and coping mechanisms.

Midwinter Break becomes a film about unfulfilled promises that were made with the best of intentions . Stella continues to carry the physical and mental scars of her and her child’s escape from serious injury. (Julie Lamberton makes fleeting appearances as the young Stella.)

Her faith has been a cornerstone to coping with what happened. But this out-of-character weekend in Amsterdam quickly becomes a point of inflection in her life. Early on in the film, a Catholic priest aptly quotes from James 4 v14: “Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow.”

Meanwhile, Hinds’ Gerry is sullen and withdrawn. His veins are part blood, part whiskey. His signs of affection towards Stella can be replaced with gruff dismissals of her desires. When the pair repeat their refrain of “You and me” / “Me and you” it’s clear that they’re no longer referring to “us” but are really two separate travellers whose lives aren’t as entwined as they once were.

Hinds’ gets to deliver a monologue about Gerry’s backstory to a Derry barman in an Irish pub in Amsterdam. The words he is given to say are flat and unmoving. In sharp contrast, Manville’s equivalent scenes, exploring what’s going on in her head, are so much more stirring and Stella remains the real emotional focus of the story throughout. Although Hinds does get the funniest line in the film when he sums up the state of their relationship by uttering “Cake?!”

The film’s script maintains much of the novel’s familiar texture, but squeezes the essential plot and character journeys into 90 minutes. There’s a lot of atmosphere but the character development – particularly of Gerry – is a bit too subtle. The final scene also lacks the heft to be believable.

Midwinter Break unpacks some of the enduring trauma that people still carry from the Troubles, and also zeroes in on what triggers us to flee certain situations. The unravelling rapport between the two lead characters is well balanced by director Polly Findlay. It’s definitely a film to watch from a comfy seat in a cinema: the opening scenes are so gentle, you’d be tempted to switch channel or get up off the sofa to make a cup of tea if you were watching at home. Midwinter Break is being screened in Queen’s Film Theatre from Friday 20 March.

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Front & Centre / Dangerous Play / Poached (6-8 March in The Playhouse)

2026-03-08T00:45:00.006+00:00

Back in November 2015, the #WakingTheFeminists campaign erupted in the realisation of a dearth of women’s voices and female creatives in the ‘Waking the Nation’ programme launched by Dublin’s Abbey Theatre.

Academic research backed up the real-life experience of Irish theatremakers. In general, the more funding an organisation received, the lower the female presence in the work. Significant gender pay disparities were revealed.

Focussing on ten of the top (Irish) Arts Council-funded organisations that produced or presented theatre in Ireland, research found that between 2006 and 2015 women who make up a little over 50% of the Irish population were less visible in

42% of cast/actors
40% of set designers
37% of directors
34% of lighting designers
28% of authors/playwrights
9% of sound designers.

In contrast, 79% of costume designers were women.

There’s evidence that some progress was made in addressing the imbalances in the years that followed. The act of measuring or observing sometime can often changes behaviour: the Hawthorne effect.

In the five years that followed, there was more than a doubling of female representation of directors (20% to 46%) and writers (17% to 34%) at the Abbey Theatre. However, male actors continued to outnumber female actors cast in productions despite 57% of students at the Lir Academy being female (2016-2020).

The situation in Northern Ireland largely mirrors what was, and is still, happening south of the border. The inaugural Front & Centre symposium ran in Belfast in May 2025, hosted in QUB’s Brian Friel Theatre, shining a spotlight on new ways of collaborating and creating space for female and non-binary playwriting in Northern Ireland.

A series of panels and workshops explored statistics, drivers, barriers and opportunities, with rehearsed readings bringing work to life in different stages of development.

Front & Centre is back for a second year, this time based up in The Playhouse in Derry. I was there on Friday and heard Olwen Dawe’s analysis of the landscape that was quickly backed up with examples and reflections from Gemma Walker-Farren (one half of MakeyUppers) and Soso Ní Cheallaigh (who creates provocative disability-led work in English and Irish).

Statistics from Thrive (NI’s research and evaluate organisation for arts and heritage) pointed out big differences in how north-west communities consume their arts. In short: less often, but spending more when they do, and often as a whole family experience rather than solo or couple attendance.

Patterns of last-minute bookings (a practice that can lead to touring shows cancelling shows due to low sales) were said to be reflective of the precarity of people’s employment (uncertain rotas, needing to keep available for work, lower regional wages) that then cause precarity in the cultural sector.

Gemma reiterated that audiences were all around and the work – not necessarily labelled as ‘theatre’ – can find people where they live. Less traditional spaces can support all kinds of work. Soso pointed to the loyalty of disability audiences and the foolishness of relying on mainstreaming to adequately capture the need and demand for work in their sectors.

Going out needed to be guaranteed to be fun. Theatre might need to see itself as the pre-drinks for a long evening of entertainment. For many, being asked to sit in the dark and face one direction (towards a stage) for two or three hours cab be both ableist and alienating.

A fascinating discussion emerged about what a matriarchal model would look like in the cultural space. Answers included that it would be built for community, and be reciprocal in terms of how audiences, creatives and venues all benefitted. There was also mention of subscription models and the need to bundle multiple activities together: theatre could come with yoga classes and vice versa.

Friday’s programme finished with two rehearsed readings.

Dangerous Play is a new work by Amanda Verlaque charting the swell and wane of interest in women’s football. She looks through the eyes of two historical players (Lily Parr and Molly Seaton played by Maeve Connelly and Orla Mullen) whose performance and results deserve much greater reputation and recognition. They look on as a couple of today’s players (Nicky/Rachel Harley and Jodie/Leanne Devlin) try and catch the eye of a scout, falling into the trap of battling with each other and forgetting that they can never stop working as a team.

Unintentionally – unless Verlaque was being devilish! – some of the dialogue screams into the Front & Centre narrative as much as into the sporting story where obstacles need to be tackled despite little money and a lack of media interest.

“It’s hard to put up a fight when no one knows you’re there.”

“Limited resources mean hard choices”

The rehearsed reading finished with a Orla Mullan bursting into song, throwing a whole new light on Verlaque’s ambition for Dangerous Play that feels like it can comfortably sit as a contemporary companion that doesn’t compete with Tara Lynne O’Neill’s 2021 Rough Girls.

Poached by Alice Malseed and Catherine Rees was a read through of what felt like a pretty finished script. A prime ministerial figure steps up to announce plans to control conception as part of a new Population Limitation policy. A ‘child consideration’ process will vet mothers. Maud (read by Rees) doesn’t score well when the state inquisitors (read by Shannen McNeice and Malseed) pose their pointed questions. Other coworkers (including those read by Orla Graham and Vicky Allen) suggest ways of gaming the system.

The satire is rich yet beautifully understated. Women alone are judged for their suitability to conceive and bring up a child. Children have become a value-laden commodity in The Great Egg Race (without Heinz Wolff and his mad 1980’s contraptions). The state stretches its hands into career paths while holding eggs as ransom. Despite being a rehearsed reading, Vicky Allen’s eyes lit up as she morphed into a new evil cyber genius who might have a way to beat the system without scrambling the conception opportunities for the women of Northern Ireland.

Thanks to Karis Kelly for the opportunity to attend Friday’s Front & Centre. If my work schedule had been different this weekend, I’d have stayed in Derry to see Carley Magee’s Growing Pains on Saturday evening (20:30), and take in the always mind-blowing scratch performances (Sunday 14:30) and the extract reading of the hotly anticipated Hello Charlie by Caoimhe Farren (Sunday 19:30). Tickets available for the workshops and performances on The Playhouse website.

Some quick reflections …

With funding levels that are so far below England, Scotland, Wales and Republic of Ireland, every area of the sector has been living under sustained pressure for more than a decade. Producers can only take so many risks. Venues need bums on seats (and drinks bought in bars) to keep the lights on. Creative decisions are clearly compromised. The familiar is rehashed. The reliable is dusted off and needs to be a blazing success in order to cover any loss-leading work that is commissioned. No matter your gender, (dis)ability or sexuality, it’s hard to get new work developed and staged. That it took five years for the award-winning script Consumed by Lyric writer-in-residence Karis Kelly (and one of the driving forces behind Front & Centre) to make it onto a Belfast stage is staggering. And her experience is just one of many.

A drive up to Derry is always worthwhile. There’s a directness that imparts local wisdom in a way that lands and doesn’t skirt around sensibilities. The nuances of audiences in the north west also speak into my stomping ground around greater Belfast.

Taking theatre into unconventional venues is already quite common in west Belfast. I’ve learned the way up to The Roddy’s on the Glen Road, most recently to see Julie (which brings to life a piece of local history in a way that connects with so many in the local audience). But to hear this weekend that Gina Donnelly’s play Anthem for Dissatisfaction – which premiered up in The Roddy’s – is being the funded (on the back of being scouted at Edinburgh Fringe Festival) to tour internationally is amazing news. Vibrant work telling stories that are both universal but also deeply rooted in this place. Pray for the subtitler!

Staging The People’s Panto in the acoustically harsh and wingless-staged St Comgall’s community space is a technical challenge for the team at Brassneck. But the quality of Neil Keery’s scripts, the committed performances, direction that neatly works around the venue’s limitations, and the rock bottom £10 ticket price means it deserves to be packed out with every seat sold.

Talk of a subscription model for theatre isn’t totally without precedent. The Grand Opera House (Bronze/Silver/Gold/Platinum) and the Lyric Theatre (Ensemble/Players/Principals/Directors Circle) membership tiers swap up-front payment for 2-for-1 tickets, discounts and advance booking (GOH only). The stream of familiar faces I recognise when reviewing shows on opening nights suggests that the schemes are well supported.

Away from theatre, Queen’s Film Theatre’s membership scheme offers a number of free tickets, discounts and loyalty points). Omniplex Cinemas’ MyOmniPass a free ticket for every movie being screened in exchange for a monthly membership fee. Though due to the seemingly inevitable creeping process of enshittification – my interview with the term’s creator Cory Doctorow at last year’s Imagine! Festival can still be viewed online – a monthly price rise was soon followed by seats being restricted to the rows where you’d prefer not to sit.

The bundling of different leisure activities would work better if existing arts organisations didn’t already have distinct physical footprints. There’s a parallel universe in which the Lyric’s theatre and rehearsal spaces together with MAC’s gallery, social and event spaces were collocated with the Crescent Arts’ thriving programme of courses and workshops. Though there’s nothing to stop a golden ticket scheme being run across multiple commercial venues or multiple producers.

Outside of Belfast, councils own and operate the majority of the main traditional regional theatre spaces. (There are some significant exceptions.) This has merits (closeness to the funder) and demerits (risk-averse and can become very inflexible). Amateur dramatic societies continue to thrive in some areas. There are almost too many youth theatre programmes to count, each creating a niche for itself with passionate freelancers delivering training and encouragement week after week for little financial reward.

The opportunities for getting new work in front of an audience are very limited. Belfast Playwrights’ 10-Minute Play festival fills a gap left by the old Pick’n’Mix festival. The new writing rehearsed readings have vanished from recent Belfast International Arts Festival programmes. Dramaturgs and literary managers no longer seem to be employed by theatres. Accidental Theatre’s 24-hour scratch play events haven’t run for a while. Though check out Amadan Ensemble’s evening of Quickfire Plays on Saturday 28 March as part of Imagine! Festival. Update - And Tinderbox’s INCUBATE festival (with ten half-hour presentations of new work) is coming up in The MAC on 18 April.

Other than stand-up comedy, only a minority of small-to-medium sized work staged in Belfast seems to tour around the rest of Northern Ireland. The big productions about Derry don’t tour to Belfast. The exchange of work between Belfast, Derry and Dublin is shockingly small. (The poor public transport links between the cities also prevent popping up or down to another city to see a show and get home the same day despite the relatatively short distances involved.)

There’s no single silver bullet. And the sector’s structural challenges quickly distract (me) from Front & Centre desire to see an even playing field that makes space for a range of voices in front of and behind the scenes … no matter the traditional/untraditional venue or whether the artistic event is sold as theatre or a jolly good time.

But it does seem that trying to make work that is more accessible, more transportable, and faster to restage when opportunities arise will benefit some theatremakers and expand audiences.

Writing new work that reflects the existential issues of today/tomorrow (and situations from the past) can appeal to audiences. Seeing yourself or your ancestors on stage is powerful. Holding truth to power on a stage can be as effective as writing a consultation response to an Assembly committee or an Executive department. There should always be room for great entertainment. But what is funny and gripping can also contain a sense of questioning and challenge.

Structurally, Northern Ireland needs

a mix of differently sized (and differently heated) rehearsal spaces;
small-medium-large performance spaces, some based in bars and old churches, and some without the word theatre anywhere to be seen;
pathways to try out work in smaller venues and allow successful productions to switch to larger stages (while other shows may go back to the drawing board);
ways of finding accommodation to support touring productions;
organisations willing to commission new work with a financial cushion to live with the occasional failure;
a lot more opportunities for new work to be read, developed and rehearsed.

Front & Centre will hopefully return. It needs to. The structural challenges are not going to disappear without a sustained push. Other arts/cultural campaigns over the next year may be able to pick up on F&C’s statistics that can show low funding levels in NI are disadvantaging vital voices.

Listening to different regional voices also challenges easy thinking. Improving opportunities for the groups targeted by Front & Centre will benefit the whole sector. Representation of disabilities could switch from being a rare success in mainstream productions to something that happens as a matter of course. Stories from newcomer communities are largely missing from NI stages at the moment: being open to voices who are currently ignored will help everyone. Counting the number of people in categories will change the sector.

I want to find out what happens in the football match after Amanda Verlaque’s cliff hanger. I want to see how the satirical look at government poached eggs can be refined and sharpen further its great concepts. But I’d also love to see Vittoria Caffola’s Bloodlines (who could forget the tale of a vegetarian butcher needing an injection of high quality sperm into her ovaries and her lesbian sister studying genetics set against the 1911 Belfast Eugenics Society!) get a full production along with so many more rehearsed readings and excepts that have stuck in my mind over the years. And pray that someone puts Abbie Spallen on stage performing her play Strandline in a Northern Ireland theatre.