It is 1936 and harvest time in County Donegal. In a house just outside the village of Ballybeg live the five Mundy sisters, barely making ends meet. The two male members of the household are brother Jack, a missionary priest, repatriated from Africa by his superiors after 25 years, and Michael, the seven-year-old child of the youngest sister. In depicting two days in the life of this menage, Brian Friel evokes not simply the interior landscape of a group of human beings trapped in their domestic situation, but the wider landscape, interior and exterior, Christian and pagan, of which they are a part. |
Diane Quadling, Ruth Galley, Louise Crediton & Liz Calnan