Grace Chapple's 2022 play premiered downstairs at Belvoir as part of the independent 25A season, and two years later got a run upstairs as part of the formal season. It's a play about five young friends in an Irish border town, starting in 1977 when they're 18 and enjoying summer holidays, against a background of occasional explosions and possible violence due to the ongoing Troubles. We flash forward to Christmas ten years later, when the friends have dispersed somewhat but are reunited when one of them, who's been living in London for a while, returns with her fiancé, an Englishman, and the mix of old tensions, regrets and the ongoing political tensions bubbles under until things boil over in a shattering climax. An epilogue 30 years later looks at the current generation and how the fallout of their parents' decisions have landed on them.
Off The Ledge's production is a solid production of Chapple's text - Lachlan Houen directs with a sense of the tensions and the messiness of old friendships reunited - the desire for reconciliation and the regret at old hurts bumping up against each other. He has a rich cast - Emily O'Mahoney as the resentful Deirdre holds a lot of the tensions of the play within her and carries them well, Joel Hrbek as the gentle Jimmy is heartwarmingly kind, and Pippin Carrol as the outsider English Harry is wide-eyed-ly shocked at the hornet's nest he's wandered into while never quite breaking etiquette to escape.
This is a skilled piece of new Australian writing given an engaging production in the intimacy of the Courtyard studio and is well worth 90 minutes of your time.
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