Theatre review: Ulster American

With a name like David Ireland, you can imagine that the playwright who specialises in controversy-courting stories about how the Troubles have left Northern Ireland with collective PTSD might attract a certain kind of American fan. If that is part of the inspiration for his latest play, it would seem to confirm suspicions that some vocal Irish-Americans care more about appearing to belong to a culture than they do about actually knowing the first thing about Irish history. Equally under the microscope and subject to ridicule is the left-leaning British theatre establishment that's championed his brutal form of comedy in recent years, as Ulster American throws together theatre people from America, England and Northern Ireland in a violent mix of hypocrisy and misunderstanding. Ruth (Louisa Harland) is a rising Northern Irish playwright whose latest play is getting a starry London premiere from director Leigh (Andy Serkis.)

Oscar-winner Jay (Woody Harrelson) is the US star leading the production, and his presence has helped the show sell out before it's even started rehearsals.

For the first half-hour of the show, the two men are alone in Leigh's living room waiting for Ruth to join them, and spend much of it in self-congratulation about how despite being straight, cisgender white men with a great deal of privilege, nobody has better feminist, anti-racist, inclusive credentials than them. But in the middle of all the spontaneous meditation and constant mentions of AA ("did nobody tell him the second A stands for Anonymous?") Jay suddenly comes up with a hypothetical question so grotesque it completely throws the director, who's consequently already a couple of glasses of wine down by the time Ruth arrives.

Their friendly introductions and chat soon devolve into discomfort as it becomes apparent that Jay knows so little about Ireland, he hasn't realised that his character in Ruth's play (about a man who goes on a killing spree decapitating priests) is a loyalist Protestant. He demands he be rewritten as a Catholic IRA member. Also he wants an eyepatch. Leigh's ignorance of what he's talking about isn't as comically grotesque as the film star's but it's exposed just as much as he backs up Jay to make sure he doesn't sabotage the big commercial hit he needs.

Jeremy Herrin's production makes the most of its stars - Harrelson knows exactly when to bring in a disingenuous aw-shucks modesty to temper his character's understated lumbering threat and blatant, unconscious abuse of power; Serkis is a more weaselly kind of villain, as well as setting up the broader comic elements of the play, which give slapstick violence a taste of the grimmer injuries it implies. Harland acts as their patient, stealthy nemesis, and having seen a couple of Ireland's plays now it's interesting the way her character is used to confront the suspicion they sometimes give, that progressive theatres might have given a mouthpiece to a much more right-wing voice than they realised. It could be slightly too many layers of metatheatricality, but granted not everyone in the audience will be familiar with any of his other work.

Although the dialogue remains funny the play did feel a bit too long to me; I’m not sure if this is because the conversations are genuinely allowed to tangle around themselves a bit too long, or if it’s just because the show’s considerably longer than the advertised 90 minutes, and in a show with this many trigger warnings you’re wound up to get a violent resolution, only for there to still be almost half an hour to go. (Find someone who loves you as much as theatres love lying about the running time.) But for all the attention-grabbing violence and controversy, I suspect what will stick with me about Ulster American is that eyepatch fixation of Jay’s: There’s little more satisfying than a running joke getting a great payoff. Except, as it turns out, one that pays off not once, not twice, but three times.

Ulster American by David Ireland is booking until the 27th of January at Riverside Studio 2.

Running time: 1 hour 55 minutes straight through.

Photo credit: Johan Persson.