Tron Theatre, Glasgow
4 stars
Growing up in Ireland during the Troubles can't have been easy. Not for
nine year old Nuala, scared of no-one as she is. Nor for her teenage
big brother Oran who she worships, especially after seeing him in the
school nativity play, when she builds him up into some kind of
ecclesiastical superhero. And at least in 1979 they have The
Undertones, Stiff Little Fingers and Thin Lizzy for comfort. But when
Oran's lifeless body is carried from the sea one day without any chance
of resurrection, the very sight of him lights the touch paper on a
series of emotional shocks that will eventually go off in Nuala's face,
changing her life in a way that's still with her ten years after.
Tara McKevitt's little fire-cracker of a play is yet another piece in
the Tron's Mayfesto season that taps into the all too human collateral
damage that any conflict brings in its wake. Performed spunkily by Emma
O'Grady in Caroline Lynch' s production for the Galway-based Mephisto
Theatre Company, Grenades may lace its central premise of sacrifice
borne out of both love and hate with a sly playground wit, but as the
reality of Nuala's situation unravels, her pain hits home like Semtex.
Much of this is down to the nuanced ferocity of O'Grady, who lends
Nuala a marmalade-haired feistiness and flint-eyed, terrier-like
instinct for survival, but suggests too a little girl too hungrily
inqusitive enough to leave things that don't concern her be. Over the
play's fifty-five minute duration, O'Grady pulls off such a tricky
balancing act with fearless verve in what proves a heart-wrenching and
brutal indictment of how easily accidents can happen.
The Herald, May 20th 2011
ends
4 stars
Growing up in Ireland during the Troubles can't have been easy. Not for
nine year old Nuala, scared of no-one as she is. Nor for her teenage
big brother Oran who she worships, especially after seeing him in the
school nativity play, when she builds him up into some kind of
ecclesiastical superhero. And at least in 1979 they have The
Undertones, Stiff Little Fingers and Thin Lizzy for comfort. But when
Oran's lifeless body is carried from the sea one day without any chance
of resurrection, the very sight of him lights the touch paper on a
series of emotional shocks that will eventually go off in Nuala's face,
changing her life in a way that's still with her ten years after.
Tara McKevitt's little fire-cracker of a play is yet another piece in
the Tron's Mayfesto season that taps into the all too human collateral
damage that any conflict brings in its wake. Performed spunkily by Emma
O'Grady in Caroline Lynch' s production for the Galway-based Mephisto
Theatre Company, Grenades may lace its central premise of sacrifice
borne out of both love and hate with a sly playground wit, but as the
reality of Nuala's situation unravels, her pain hits home like Semtex.
Much of this is down to the nuanced ferocity of O'Grady, who lends
Nuala a marmalade-haired feistiness and flint-eyed, terrier-like
instinct for survival, but suggests too a little girl too hungrily
inqusitive enough to leave things that don't concern her be. Over the
play's fifty-five minute duration, O'Grady pulls off such a tricky
balancing act with fearless verve in what proves a heart-wrenching and
brutal indictment of how easily accidents can happen.
The Herald, May 20th 2011
ends
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