It’s 3 a.m and Brian (Gary Lilburn) is the Taxi driver at the end of his shift. He is joined by his two youngest sons, Dara (Eoin Geoghegan) and Ray (Seán Doyle). Three actors, an audience of 12, a bag of chips and a minibus – Written by Padraic Walsh and directed by Cathal Cleary, this is Blue Thunder, a gem of theatre currently touring Ireland, following its debut at Dublin Fringe festival.
The minibus is chilly enough and we are uncomfortably close to other passengers. We are immediately eavesdropping from the back seats on Brian’s anxious late night phone calls, and as his two sons pile into the van we can smell the chips and vinegar – but mercifully are left to imagine their booze-breath.
The atmosphere on the bus is claustrophobic and electric. The lighting is cleverly managed. For 45 minutes we are immersed in the tricky relationship between Brian and his two drunken sons – all three of whom are having trouble with the women in their lives. At the heart of the matter is their inability to communicate with one another, their lack of understanding of each other’s lives and feelings.
As in all good theatre, we are drawn into the reality unfolding in front of us – and super-conscious of every cough, or breath, from our fellow audience members. This is all about a family’s inability, perhaps the men in the family’s inability in particular, to truly listen to one other, to hear and empathise with one another’s feelings. And perhaps that inability is at the root of the failure of each of their relationships. Blue Thunder is a deftly scripted emotional roller coaster as truths and secrets are revealed -- and we the audience have literally no way to escape. At one point Dara suddenly starts the engine of the bus – where may we be taken by the revelations?
The one-act play ends abruptly and we are left with the question – has anything changed? And if so, what? Is it possible for there to have been a genuine exchange of stories and feeling among the three men and nothing to have changed? Or perhaps things will not change immediately, but we can hope that this encounter may have transformed their relationships in the longer term.
I am reminded of three of my most memorable theatre performances, all of which had some unique aspect to their staging. There was the eight hour reading of The Great Gatsby performed at the Noel Coward theatre in London in 2012, and Jez Butterworth’s The River with Dominic West, in which a fish was fried on stage – performed at The Royal Court upstairs with just 90 seats in the audience. The night I was there, having finally managed to get tickets by pressing the phone buttons precisely at 9 am as they were released, Kirsten Scott Thomas and John Malkovich were in the audience – and I bet they hadn’t had to use a digital timer to get their tickets. But two of those favourite performances were also from An Grianan – an extraordinary production of The Winter’s Tale, directed by Philip Parr and performed in July 2019 which started in Greencastle, Co Donegal and continued on the ferry to Magilligan Strand in Derry/Londonderry. It “crossed the borders, the traditions and the waters” of the northwest on a brilliantly hot and sunny day. A bus also featured in a 2017 Lughnasa Frielfest performance of Brian Friel’s The Faith Healer, each of its four acts performed in a different village hall around Glenties.
I have seen plenty of plays starring famous actors, but really I prefer my theatre without them. The best theatre, I believe, allows each of the characters to shine, and showcases the usually remarkable skills of ordinary professional or amateur actors, inviting them to inhabit their characters without the distraction of stardom. Much West End theatre these days is spoiled by the exorbitant price of the tickets and the live phone screens and crisp-eating of fellow audience members. At only E20.00 per ticket, Blue Thunder offered memorable and good value theatre in a truly inventive and exclusive setting. There is a thrill to having acquired the last two tickets and I shall remember it for a long time. Unless it is an affectionate nod to the 1983 film of the same name, one further mystery remains – the meaning of the title. But catch it if you can.