The Abbey’s revisiting of Marina Carr’s 1990s coruscating work continued apace with a revival of Portia Coughlan starring Denise Gough.
Portia Coughlan is turning 30. But she has no intention of marking the day with any positivity, instead drinking alone as soon as the kids have gone to school, as her husband Raphael (Marty Rea) discovers to his horror. Despite the best attempts of her friends and family to cheer her up, and her own fumbled affairs with local likely lads, the day is hollowed out by the absence of her twin brother Gabriel who drowned himself years before. And the horror of that long past day will be lived all over again, and then explained, thanks to Carr’s curious structure.
The opening line of the play signals that extreme abrasiveness is about to follow. And the influence of Pulp Fiction is plain to see in the death of Portia, in what seems an incredibly bold stroke, only for the clock to rewind as we follow her up to that point, as Carr once again invests the Midlands with the depravity and ritual horror of Ancient Greek myths. Once again the lack of an interval seems less a means of sustaining tension and more an affectation as an obvious curtain is played through. Caroline Byrne, however, directs with a keen eye for pace and balance between black comedy and harrowing drama.
4/5
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