Irish writer Conor McPherson also directs this West End revival of the play that sent his career into the stratosphere when it opened at the Royal Court Theatre in 1997. It’s lost none of its gently haunting, melancholic pull in the intervening years. The Weir is a classic example of a play where nothing really seems to happen, but then you realise you’ve seen pretty much all of life pass by.
Here, Brendon Gleeson steps into the shoes of garage owner Jack, who we meet chewing over his day with publican Brendan (Owen McDonnell) in an Irish boozer in County Leitrim. They’re joined by Jim (Sean McGinley). Their conversation is as familiar as the ritual of their drink orders in designer Rae Smith’s well realised pub set, with its fading knick-knacks. But this fireside beer routine is interrupted when the man they’ve been making snide remarks about, Finbar (Tom Vaughan-Lawlor), appears with a newcomer to the village, Valerie (Kate Phillips), who stuns pub owner Brendan by ordering a glass of white wine. Soon, though, she is drawn into their world of storytelling.
The cast quickly establishes a believable, lived-in chemistry. An effortlessly charismatic Gleeson sinks as deeply into Jack as if he’s grown gruffly out of his bar stool – crotchety and drily funny. McGinley imbues ponderous Jim with an amusing lack of self-awareness tempered, at times, by an almost noble sincerity. Meanwhile, restlessly springy, with an ever-ready grin and eager to impress people, Vaughan-Lawlor is hilarious as Finbar, proudly flashing £20 notes around. McDonnell’s Brendan wears his job like a glove, a man happy with his lot and who forms a connection with Valerie, who Phillips imbues with a gentle amusement at her new drinking companions, as well with a reserve and guardedness that hints at deeper depths.
McPherson builds a portrait of people whose seemingly mundane lives are deeply rooted in the landscape and history of where they live. They tell Valerie stories about fairies and of ghost children knocking on walls when the weir water rises. The supernatural lives alongside the day-to-day. The play’s rolling rhythm beautifully evokes an atmosphere of loss and regret like a low throb beneath the crotchety camaraderie that also defines these men who have forged connections across a bar. When Valerie eventually reveals why she has moved to the village, it’s not a dramatic plot twist, but quietly, humanly, devastating.
