The Beauty Queen of Leenane – the Tony Award-winning play written by Oscar recipient Martin McDonagh – will take Aberdeen audiences on an emotional rollercoaster, says the show’s director Lyn McAndrew.
“It’s hilariously funny but also very touching and poignant. You feel as if you’ve been through a complete range of emotions by the end of it,” said Lyn who remembers seeing the original production of the play when it premiered in the 90s.
“I remember coming out (of the theatre) and thinking ‘wow, what an experience’.
“I’ve always wanted to direct it and I’m absolutely thrilled to be doing it now.”
The Beauty Queen of Leenane writer Martin McDonagh – who also wrote and directed the hugely popular Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri – has just premiered his new film The Banshees of Inisherin at the Venice International Film Festival.
The film, which sees Martin reunite with the stars of his 2008 movie In Bruges – Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson, earned a 13-minute standing ovation – the longest reception of any film that premiered at the festival this season.
The Beauty Queen of Leenane is one of Martin McDonagh’s finest works
Will The Tivoli audience also give The Beauty Queen of Leenane a standing ovation when the Rapture Theatre production premieres in Aberdeen later this week?
The play – which follows the life of Maureen Folan who leads an isolated life with Mag, her demanding, manipulative mother – is certainly worth it, with Lyn calling it a “masterpiece”.
“Maureen is an unmarried woman – the youngest of three daughters – and she’s been expected to take care of her elderly mother Mag. It’s a hard and miserable life and she wishes she could have had a different life.
“I think that resonates with a lot of women – and some men too – who have that expectation to look after an elderly relative whether they want to or not.
“She just really longs for some excitement in her life.
“Mag is a quite demanding woman. Life has become smaller for her. She’s old and vulnerable and is living in isolation with her daughter. But she’s quite manipulative as well. She wants to get her own way.”
With the arrival of an unexpected admirer, Maureen finally sees the possibility of escaping her dismal life, but her mother has other plans…
Complicated mother-daughter relationship
Lyn said the audiences have really identified with their complex relationship.
The director said: “I can’t remember ever reading another play that has managed to capture the nature of the mother-daughter relationship better than this one – and it’s written by a man!
“Maybe somebody looking in from the outside is able to tell it as it is – more than you can when you’re actually in that situation.
“Martin McDonagh is a tremendous writer. I love his work.
“He was born and brought up in London. His family was from rural Ireland so he was able to be part of that community when he came over to visit them but he also wasn’t part of it too because he was a Londoner.
“It’s the insight of being on the outside as well as being on the inside that gave him the ability to write about things so truthfully.
“The Beauty Queen of Leenane is the first in the trilogy of his plays. Some of the actors who are working with me on this play have actually been in some of the other plays.”
90s play just as relevant in 2022
While the show is set in the early 1990s, Lyn thinks it’s just as relevant in 2022.
She said: “One of the things that makes the play relevant is that it deals with the idea of isolation and loneliness. And coming out of the last few years, we’ve all been isolated and felt lonely at times so it really does touch a nerve now.”
This will be the first time in seven years that Rapture Theatre – one of Scotland’s leading touring theatre companies – will visit Aberdeen. And the show’s director is particularly looking forward to taking the show to The Tivoli.
“We’re delighted to be coming back to Aberdeen,” said Lyn.
“One of the reasons we’re coming to The Tivoli is that a few years ago I did a tour with Dorothy Paul who’s a well-known variety artist.
“She told me that The Tivoli was the very first theatre she ever played in and she’s coming to see the show one of the nights we’re in Aberdeen – so I’m thrilled about that too.”
The Beauty Queen of Leenane is at The Tivoli from Friday September 9 to Saturday September 10. Tickets can be purchased here.
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