Preview: The Weir, Bristol Old Vic

In a small Irish town, the locals exchange stories round the crackling fire of Brendan’s pub to while away the hours one stormy night. As the beer and whisky flows, the arrival of a young stranger, haunted by a secret from her past, turns the tales of folklore into something more unsettling. One story, however, is more chilling and more real than any of them could have ever imagined.

Winner of the 1997 Olivier Award for Best New Play, Conor McPherson’s chilling classic The Weir embarks on its first ever UK tour this autumn courtesy of English Touring Theatre, looking in at Bristol Old Vic from Tue, Oct 10 to Sat, Oct 14.

Here are some thoughts from actor Sean Murray, who plays lifelong resident and heavy-drinking mechanic Jack.

With its stories drawing on Irish folklore, is The Weir a specifically Irish drama?
Yes, it is a specifically Irish drama – not least because specific Irish locations are mentioned in the text and the language is very particular to Ireland. Our piece is set in Leitrim, on the south-west coast of Ireland. However, that is not to say that the themes explored in the play are specific to Ireland. There are common human themes of loneliness, death, isolation and bereavement, to name but a few.

Pics: Marc Brenner

“The play is as much about a lack of close relationships and missed connections as it is about anything else.” Fair comment? And if so, what other themes make up the ‘anything else’?
Those are both major themes in the play. But there are many others. Jealousy, revenge, loss of community, holding on to community, sexual repression…

It sounds the sort of play where the actors’ performances are particularly crucial – without action, scene changes, costumes, effects to share the dramatic workload. Do you approach a play like this in a different way than you might another, less character-driven play?
I try to approach every play from the point of view of the characters. I could write for hours about this, but, to give you one example of part of our rehearsal process, there are about thirty other characters mentioned in the play, who don’t appear on stage. So we sourced photographs of these characters and hung them around the rehearsal room so that we all had a common image. We did this with locations as well.

What sort of impact do you hope the play has on audiences?
I’m going to make life easy for myself here: it’s getting late, so I’ll quote from Hamlet: “The purpose of playing, whose end, both at the first and now, was and is to hold, as ’twere, the mirror up to nature, to show virtue her own feature, scorn her own image, and the very age and body of the time his form and pressure.”
I hope that the audience will be moved to laughter, tears, recognition of themselves and others they have loved, do and will love, or not. And I hope that they will want to come to the theatre again to further enrich their understanding of the human condition.

Sean Murray (centre) as Jack

Tell us about Jack: his past, what he’s doing in the bar that night, how you feel (and audiences might feel) about him.
Jack is in his mid fifties, never married. He has lived here all his life. He was an only child and both his parents are dead. The inhabitants of this bar are the closest he has to family and he is in this bar every evening if possible. He is an alcoholic and smokes excessively.
He is a mechanic and has a small garage nearby, a business that was handed to him by his father. He is fiercely protective of his dwindling community.
I love him, I hate him, I feel sorry for him and rejoice in his resilience. I want to give him a great big hug. I hope that the audiences might feel similarly.

The Weir is at Bristol Old Vic from Tuesday, Oct 10 to Saturday, Oct 14. For more info, visit www.bristololdvic.org.uk/the-weir.html

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