The sheer intensity of Yerma’s childless pllght, and sorrow, shone through Tinderbox’s version of Lorca’s 1930s drama at the Lyric Theatre. She howled, repeatedly asked why she couldn’t bear a child, heard babies crying in her head. Caoimhe Farren was remarkable, believable when she gets drunk and somewhat aggressive as the wicked godmother at a family christening. The scene where the baby unravels to reveal an empty shawl and cotton wool in her arms was touching in the extreme.
This adaptation by Patrick J O’Reilly was beset by cleverness. Re-set in the Cooley Mountains, in and around a yellow car, Lorca’s famous psychological claustrophobia was clear to see. There was no escape as the characters got in and out of the back and front doors. In a way, the play had been transported to updated Brian Friel territory but with karaoke and Yerma’s gossipy sisters belting out religious numbers around the vehicle with suggestive gestures.
It all began so cheerfully, with quips and the relatable atmosphere of a family gathering and Mammy having made a curry. The universality was there from the start, indicated by the cast list referring to Rebel Daughters and Her for Yerma, rather than names. The issues were clear – what is a woman without a child? Yerma’s hapless but successful farmer husband John (believable Stefan Dunbar) tries his best to calm her but their bickering indicates a less than successful marriage. Our sympathies are engaged by this difficult woman whose family label her mad and whose mother wants to “wallop” her. Laura Hughes was a convincing Mammy.
We skipped between eras a bit, with references to IVF but also to herbs used by a wise woman to increase fertility. Yerma tries some herbal pills, gets high and later is at the centre of a maypole with her sisters dancing round her. The rituals were powerful.
There is also another man, a real love interest, Victor (excellent Matthew Forsythe), who could have been or might still be the answer to Yerma’s prayers. For it’s suggested baby making depends on hot blood and desire, even though the mother at this christening, the youngest sister, became pregnant by fairly happy accident.
Described as a smash-up of Emmerdale and folk horror movie Midsommar, this Yerma had a whiff of Channel 5 about the denouement which was in fact genuinely shocking. After a tough scene in which John reveals that he doesn’t want children, and never has (“Life’s easier without them…”), asking his wife to be satisfied with what they have, she attacks him. He falls and she strangles the person who is her last hope of becoming a mother.
Patrick J O’Reilly directed with energy and the play formed part of the Belfast International Arts Festival.
Jane Hardy
