The Stage

Stones in His Pockets

Published Wednesday 21 December 2011 at 11:01 by Ben Dowell

A breakout hit when it premiered in the late 1990s, Marie Jones’ two-hander about a rural Irish community invaded by a Hollywood “fillum” crew is an actor’s dream.

Jamie Beamish and Owen McDonnell take on the parts of Charlie and Jake - the extras and central duo - plus a host of others including various locals, the glamorous film star Caroline Giovanni, her minders and the poor young local dreamer who kills himself after his dreams of making it big are dashed.

The play satirises film-maker phoniness while also casting a sharply critical light on the misplaced dreams of those who live in this backwater. Are Charlie and Jake’s hopes and expectations of better things merely a Hollywood-style fantasy?

Compared with a play like Jez Butterworth’s Jerusalem, Jones’ portrait of rural frustrations could be potentially tame and her lament for a lost Ireland expresses itself through what comes perilously close to a caricature of the arrogant Americans and their snooty British crew.

But there is poignancy as well as a beautiful simplicity to her writing and director Indhu Rubasingham (Nicolas Kent’s imminent successor) smartly focuses her directorial vision on the story’s darker and more tragic aspects.

Hers is a production for a modern Ireland where the Celtic tiger has been caged and neutered. It is usually played on a bare stage but here the dark backdrop of mournfully dark green hills seems feels more foreboding than usual.

It’s also a play which also offers two actors a genuine showcase. Both Beamish and McDonnell tease out the differences between the more optimistic Charlie and more world weary Jake. But Beamish in particular excels at the other roles. His Caroline Giovanni is beautifully, cruelly spot on and his turn as the elderly English director is deliciously nuanced.

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