Maria Roberts on a must-see production about Manchester past and present
Rory Mullarkey has long had a relationship with the Royal Exchange. In 2013, aged 25, he was the youngest playwright to have his work staged in the main auditorium. His wunderkind debut, Cannibals, was a savage tale of distress and adversity that left you feeling equally revulsed and in awe of the brutality on stage. There are hues of that savagery in his latest work.
Commissioned by the Royal Exchange for its 50th Anniversary Homecoming series, Even These Things (directed by James Macdonald) is an epic story of Manchester over three centuries. In 1846, Annie Donovan has a score to settle; in 1996, an IRA bomb explodes on a Saturday morning; and in 2026, Jenny leaves London to move back to the city she once called home.
The play opens with Elaine Cassidy’s enraged Annie Donovan; seven months pregnant to a man from Huddersfield, whose incredible thighs offset his poor constitution for responsibility. Read on - it's free.
