But We're Right

Molly Murphy Hazzard and Kate Brosnan in But We're Right. Image, Joyce Mylod.

****

But We’re Right, written and directed by Morghan Welt, marks a revival for Welt and Bad Things Theatre, a collective of Irish-German, freelance theatre makers. Original presented in Smock Alley in 2024, Welt’s two hander was seen in preview at DU Players Theatre, TCD, given it played for only two dates in Dublin before heading out on tour. Even allowing for being seen in preview, its script is technically clunky in places and the production shows frequent directorial errors. Or, simply put, it reveals its young practitioners lack of experience. That out of the way, it also needs to be said that But We’re Right is one of the freshest, bravest and most intelligent theatrical responses to the issue of immigration, with this fledgling company displaying an abundance of dramatic and theatrical smarts. Delivering politically engaged theatre with a committed cast, a risk taking writer and director, and a passionate script, with a ladder and football thrown in for good measure.

Like many modern scripts, But We’re Right structurally leans towards the screen rather than stage, its short scenes interlinked to make a cohesive whole. In which names prove to be a thing by virtue of not being used. Welt’s town with no name as likely to be anywhere for being everywhere. It’s two Everywomen BFF’s who could be anyone for being everyone. After a laboured, no win contest between Saoirse Miller’s captivating music and recorded testimonies from The Cross Border Chorus of immigrants in Ireland, the latter frequently muffled, action finally gets underway at breakneck pace. Pace a continual problem for injecting a hurried, nervous energy that isn’t needed. Welt’s smart, sassy script frequently resorting to short snappy sentences and playing rapid verbal tennis. A device that, when overplayed, frequently inserts the author into proceedings via self-conscious technique.

Molly Murphy Hazzard and Kate Brosnan in But We're Right.  Image, Joyce Mylod.

Within a handful of minutes our two protagonists have intelligently skirted Irish people having foreign maids, the rights of sex workers, casual sex in the workplace and concerns over immigrants moving into small town anywhere. All done without battering you over the head with self righteous tirades or endless statistics. Kate Brosnan and Molly Murphy Hazzard both superb at finding that sweet spot between playing general types and specific characters. In this instance, two friends affected by the rhetoric and ideology of xenophobia. Its mixture of lies, rumours and lived experience interpreted so that the exception is held up to be the rule. “They’re rapists taking our jobs and our accommodation. I’m not right wing, I’m a patriot.” So say those from one of the greatest diasporas the world has ever known, relatively speaking, who are as likely to have friends or family living abroad as, oh, I don’t know, a refugee perhaps?

When you feel an impact personally, that’s when you’re more likely to be swayed towards hatred or hope, towards new dawns or old yesterdays. Lost jobs and accommodation, violent crime and its consequences having a profound impact on Welt’s two protagonists. Their reversals, and opposing journeys, cleverly charted, with the immigrant always present via regular voice overs. Yet whilst giving them voice, But We’re Right’s primary concern is understanding an indigenous people's response to immigrants in a housing crisis, jobs at risk community, which it does with immense intelligence and great sensitivity. If the end lacks a degree of textual clarity, its emotional resonance is keenly felt, all the more powerful for not resorting to easy sensationalism or lazy sentimentality.

Kate Brosnan and Molly Murphy Hazzard in But We're Right.  Image, Joyce Mylod.

Theatrically, But We’re Right shows a triumph of imagination over budget. Eschewing the graffiti realism of its previous staging, a ladder is used to cleverly suggest status and reinvigorate the playing space, illuminated smartly by Samuel Ferrie’s evocative lights, with Erica Smith's costumes articulating individuality without overstatement. When it comes to props, not since The Changeling has a ball been employed to such perfect and haunting effect. Throughout, Welt’s compositional direction is clever and assured. Yet given Brosnan and Murphy Hazzard frequently play the line rather than the scene, more likely to happen when the writer is also the director and allowed too much leniency, the case for an independent director gains credence. Welt’s two cast members holding such restraints to account with performances that shine whenever the actor is trusted to articulate rather than reiterate. Yet these minor bumps are all part of a young company’s learning curve, where confidence grows by doing. What’s clearly evident is that what can’t be taught this cast and crew already possess. What they need, experience, they can easily acquire. Once they do, they might well prove to be a formidable outfit.

You could argue But We’re Right would have benefited from another round of revision and rewrites, pushing and polishing to make it truly brilliant. That said, it is, by far, one of smartest political productions, thematically and theatrical, currently doing the circuit. If it avoids some of the more thornier issues - tensions between multi-cultural and inter-culturalism, the challange for local cultures in new cultural melting pots, the distinction between immigration and government sponsored mass immigration -  it never loses sight that at the heart of the immigration experience are real, living people on both sides of the equation. Ultimately, it was never designed to answer, or even ask, all of the questions, but rather to try find a way to begin conversations on more solid, more sympathetic, less antagonistic ground. That it manages to achieve, proving beautifully fluent in its imperfections. Not bad for a fledgling outfit.

But We’re Right, written and directed by Morghan Welt, presented by Bad Things Theatre, is currently on tour.

DUPlayers Theatre, Samuel Beckett Centre, 29th and 30th of April, 7PM

Galway Theatre Festival, Bank Of Ireland Theatre 3rd and 4th of May, 6PM

Fuse International Festival, London, Arthur Cotterell Theatre Studio, 3rd of July, 7PM

Edinburgh Fringe Fest, The Sanctuary, Paradise Green, 2nd till 9th of August, 4.20PM