Shirley Valentine is their Christmas antidote. Though the Grinch hasn’t totally stolen Christmas as a nativity anecdote does hook the first act of Willy Russell’s play into the festive season.
Julie Alderdice confidently takes on the one woman show, whisking the audience into the mind of 42-year-old Shirley, a Liverpool woman who has become lonely and frustrated in her marriage to Joe. She’s reduced to talking to the kitchen wall as she gets his dinner ready for him coming home. A friend wants her to go on holiday with her in Greece. But she couldn’t leave the husband and grown up kids behind … or could she?
Russell was a women’s hairdresser and ran a salon for a few years. While talking to the wall always feels like a clunky device to explain the titular character’s monologue, his play has aged remarkably well over the last 37 years. The coming of (middle) age story is laced with laughter but also full of sobering thoughts.
Alderdice adopts a gentle Scouse accent and draws the audience into Shirley’s inner turmoil. She riffs off topics like a bouncing pinball, from female orgasms to spinach. After one particular dinner dish was declined, Shirley takes a deep breath and becomes more intentional about living her life to its full. An interfering neighbour is wonderfully put in her place as Julie’s confidence grows.
What starts out as a gradual emancipation is fully realised when the play resumes after the interval. Shirley is in a totally different place, geographically and mentally, and is taking risks, discovering herself and enjoying life. All the more remarkable
The early line “Marriage is like the Middle East: there’s no solution” is even more pertinent in 2023 than back in 2019 and 2020 when the Lyric staged the play starring Tara Lynne O’Neill.
While the preparation of the pivotal eggs and chips dinner is core to the first act, Trevor Gill’s direction allows Alderdice to abandon her pots and pans on the stove and retreat to talking at the table rather than dwelling near the cooker. Some productions make Shirley pace around the kitchen like a caged animal. This one leaves Shirley’s words and mood to do the talking without visual metaphors.
Shirley Valentine is an unusual but pleasing production for the month of December. The show continues at the Sanctuary Theatre in east Belfast until Saturday 23 December.
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