Passions run high in the protestant Rainey household when the elder son wants to marry a local Catholic girl in Irish-born playwright St John Ervine’s taut, first drama of conflicting loyalties, written in 1911 and set in Belfast 4 years earlier.
With the dock workers on strike for a fair deal and the dissent fuelled by political agitators, respected head of the family John (Daragh O’Malley) is persuaded to help unite both sides of the religious divide in a common cause against the factory owners.
The timing couldn’t be worse. As tensions mount and personal and public interests collide, the Rainey men refuse to back down and it’s left to Fiona Victory’s staunch materfamilias to try and maintain the peace between father and son in this powerful 80 minute domestic tragedy of destructive intransigence.
Finborough Theatre, Finborough Road, SW10 9ED Tube: Earl’s Court ticketweb.co.uk Until October 29 (£11-£15)
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