The Beauty Queen of Leenane

“There are plenty of other things just as dangerous that can finish you off just as easily. Maybe even more easily.” “Like what?” “Well, this rotten little town of ours, for one.”

In a remote town in Ireland’s Connemara mountains live two women: Morine, a thin, unattractive spinster, and her elderly, infirm mother, Meg. Morine’s days are filled with hatred for her mother. She cannot stand Meg’s hypochondria and manipulation, or the fact that she cannot cook even soup or porridge, and empties her chamber pot into the kitchen sink every morning. One day, the neighbours, brothers Pat and Ray, invite Morine to a farewell party for their uncle. She decides to go and spends the night with Pat, whom she brings home. He becomes Morine’s first boyfriend—and her ticket to leaving her manipulative mother and the small town behind. But Meg’s manipulative ways and Morine’s troubled past complicate her search for happiness. Will Morine manage to escape the clutches of the small town and a monotonous life? Or is reality not quite what it seems?

Director Ieva Stundžytė says: “I first encountered the playwright’s work while I was studying at LMTA, when I saw Jonas Vaitkus’s production of The Pillowman at the Youth Theatre and, during the Klaipėda Drama Theatre’s tour in Vilnius, Gy tis Padegimas’s production of The Beauty Queen of Leenane. What stayed with me was not the productions themselves but, above all, Martin McDonagh’s writing and the impressions it left: themes so sharp they make you uncomfortable; playful, controversial dialogue that seems written with a light touch; paradoxical situations that are, somehow, deeply recognisable; and black humour taken to the point of absurdity.

“Women are also very important to me—as performers, as characters, and in a broader sense. I consciously look for material for productions that is for women and, though not necessarily about women, features women. In my view, describing a woman as ‘beautiful’ or ‘strong’ is profoundly ambiguous. Beauty means being yourself and free from other people’s opinions; feeling that you matter to yourself, that you care for yourself and love yourself. Strength means acknowledging your exhaustion, anger and hurts; allowing yourself to experience your full emotional range; and exposing stereotypes. In creating this production, I am trying to distil all of this and, taking the play as my point of departure, bring it to life.”

The project is funded by the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Lithuania.