Republican News · Thursday 14 August 2003

Humour, hope and black hacks

Féile Play Review
Black Taxi
Dubbeljoint Production
Written by Brian Moore
Directed by Pam Brighton

History plays are not easy to write; even the king of world literature, William Shakespeare, had some difficulty, as anyone who has had to sit through the buttock-numbing Henry VI plays will likely attest.

The problem lies in achieving a balance between sticking to the facts (Shakespeare, of course, was famously cavalier about this) and telling a good story. Writers of every ilk, when faced with the choice, are disinclined to let the former get in the way of the latter.

In his new play, which opened at the BIHFE on Thursday as part of the Festival,

Brian Moore was faced with a similar dilemma - turning random events into a coherent and entertaining narrative whilst remaining true to the actuality of those events. Not the internecine squabbling of a bunch of inbred, power-crazed English aristos, but rather the struggle of working class Irish people to overcome the everyday difficulties foisted on to them by a state they neither want nor need.

In that sense, Black Taxi, although properly described as a comedy rather than history, serves, like the best history plays, as a metaphor for something greater than the events it portrays. It is on one level the story of the genesis of the black taxis that trundle up and down the Falls Road, providing not only cheap and reliable transport for the local community, but also valuable employment in an area where unemployment is an ongoing problem.

But the play is also about the last 30-odd years of conflict and it is about the people of West Belfast. It is a testament to their ingenuity, resistance and ability to overcome the myriad barriers placed in they way by the authorities. It is also a fitting memorial to the eight drivers who have been murdered as they carried out their vital roles.

The play itself takes the form of a dialogue between a cynical, seasoned black taxi man played by Terry O'Neill and a young, enthusiastic wannabe played by Marc O'Shea. Through their interaction, and through interpolated scenes in which the two play many other characters, ranging from passengers to City Hall 'suits', British soldiers and MI5 men, the audience is taken through the formation and development of the West Belfast Taxi Assocation, which flowered against the backdrop of the removal of public transport services from nationalist areas in Belfast in the upheavals of 1969 and beyond. Incidentally, a few days after I saw the play, a friend remarked that he recalled more than one occasion when a riot on the Shankill Road would precipitate the swift removal of buses from the Falls Road.

It is a fascinating and instructive story, not least because it reveals the lengths to which the authorities were prepared to go to try and thwart the Association. The nobbling of insurance companies to persuade them to refuse to insure the cabs and drivers was just one of the tactics employed.

As in previous productions, Dubbeljoint was fortunate in attracting fine young talent. Marc O'Shea is already well on the way to establishing himself as an actor and turned in an assured performance. He is a rather good comic actor and has an impressive range of English accents at his command.

At one point he was an indolent, bullying northern squaddie; at another an estuary-speaking MI5 man.

Terry O'Neill, who seems to be in the process becoming an actor who does some singing, rather than a singer who occasionally turns his hand to acting, was perhaps experiencing first-night nerves, which caused him a little trouble with his lines. Even so, he displayed enough comic talent to overcome this and there seemed to be little doubt that the audience thoroughly enjoyed the performance of both men.

But the script itself was the star. Moore managed, on the whole, to resist the lure of didacticism and allowed the innate, incredible wit of the West Belfast community, its ability to laugh at itself and its ability to find humour and hope in the worst of situations, shine through his characters.

BY FERN LANE