FRANK MCGUINNESS’ powerful play Carthaginians, written as an elegy for the dead of Bloody Sunday, comes to the Town Hall Theatre next week in a new production from Derry’s Millennium Forum directed by one of Ireland’s best known actors, Adrian Dunbar.
Carthaginians is set in a Derry graveyard in the aftermath of Bloody Sunday where a mother, mourning the loss of her child, believes the dead might rise again and gathers a group of Derry citizens all dealing with the collective guilt of having survived while those belonging to them have died.
The play explores themes of loss and struggle within a community trying to come to terms with the devastation of their city. And where Dido was the mythical queen and founder of Carthage, in McGuinness’s play she is transmuted into the flamboyant homosexual Dido, “the Queen of Derry” and Carthaginians’ central character.
This production commemorates the 40th anniversary of Bloody Sunday and, perhaps surprisingly, is the first time the play has been professionally presented by a Derry company. Carthaginians premiered at the Peacock in 1988 and its first staging in Derry came four years later, in a touring production by Druid directed by Frank McGuinness himself.
Ahead of this new production’s visit to Galway, director Adrian Dunbar talked about the play and began by reflecting on the initial reaction from Derry when it was first staged; after all this is no orthodox elegy, shot through as it is with dirty jokes, quizzes, snatches of song, and satiric barbs.
“It was a bit of a shock to people,” Dunbar recalls. “Not only because of the politics but because of the gender politics within the play. It was also seen in Derry as a play that was trying to ask questions and it was asking the right kind of questions about seeking the truth of the situation, and as we know it took quite some time for that to happen.”
Dunbar discusses the topicality of this new staging.
“There’s definitely a resonance about it now, a lot of people are very keen to see how the play might have changed post the apology from the British government and their recognition that the people were innocent. Of course for the families there won’t be real closure until the soldiers involved are brought to court.
“In the North of Ireland there are thousands of people who have been affected by the war and thousands who also feel the guilt of survival. There are many people who could have said to their husband or their wife, their son or daughter ‘Just hang on five minutes’ and they would have saved their lives.
“Those people are now suffering with the collective guilt, and the only people who can really absolve them from that are people who were there themselves so in a way Carthaginians is talking about people who are living with the aftermath of a horrible moment.”
Dunbar illustrates his point about the lingering after-effects of the ‘Troubles’ with a personal anecdote:
“I remember being at a party in Omagh about six months after the bomb and on two separate occasions there people just completely broke down and everyone else just kept on going while a few people went to attend to the ones who were crying. Everyone knew they’d suddenly been struck by something, maybe they’d seen someone at the party that they’d seen on the day of the bomb, something had triggered that emotional response.
“Those casualties are all over the North and the play is trying to say that if we can get the truth out and forgive ourselves we might be able to move on from this place we find ourselves stuck in. I think there is a chance with this play to provide a little bit of hope, it offers a chance to push forward, a sense of people being released from that moment they feel trapped in.”
While Carthaginians does full justice to the sorrow and pain of its characters, it also includes an uproariously funny play-within-a-play, penned by Dido and entitled The Burning Balaclava, which mercilessly sends up the whole conflict.
“We had a run of that scene this morning and it’s just so funny,” Dunbar declares. “It’s such a great pastiche of the whole thing and it’s hilarious. If Frank hadn’t leavened the play with those massive moments of humour it would be very difficult to take it because it’s a tough piece emotionally but there’s great humour throughout especially in the character of Dido.
“Chris Robinson plays Dido in our production and he’s a fabulous actor with a great sense of comedy and timing but also he’s gay, and I think this might be the first time an openly gay actor has played the part. He’s going to be incredible in the part, he’s really got a brilliant sense of it. He was making me laugh this morning and when you’re sitting in a theatre on your own and the cast are onstage and you’ve seen them do the scene 50 times and the guy is still making you laugh you know you’re on a winner.”
The cast includes Orla Charlton, Lucia MacAnespie, Sara Dylan, Liam McMahon, Brian Hutton, and Matthew McElhinney.
Carthaginians is at the Town Hall Theatre on Saturday March 3 at 8pm. Tickets are available from the Town Hall on 091 - 569777 and www.tht.ie
