VAULT FESTIVAL REVIEW: The 4th Country ★★★★

The 4th Country
The Crypt, Vault Festival
Tuesday 11th - Sunday 16th February 2020

In October 2019, the abortion laws in Northern Ireland were finally discriminated after many years of fighting for freedom, with Plaine Heroines taking on this monumentous time in history to tell real life stories from the time before the movement, in this poignant and often harrowing, ambitious piece. Kate Reid's writing puts four performers, including herself, at the heart of the piece, with an initial apology towards the audience, for this isn't a show about leprechauns and Irish Dancing, but instead a story that at the time changed history, and had inspiration from press that would often only earned single articles in the British media.

Aoife Kennan, Cormac Elliot, Kate Reid, and Rachel Rooney take the stage together to tell this tale, as we follow Connor Murphy and his sibling Niamh, one of many families who were affected before the change in law. This is also a story that we as the audience straight away feel like we know the outcome, as an initial scene is interrupted by Rooney in a desperate attempt for it's abandonment in continuation, and to instead backtrack several months earlier so that we as the audience can delve into the full extent of Niamh's story. It's breathtaking at time's to showcase such passion, especially from the three native Irish performers in the company, as it is their story to tell, and one that they may have possibly lived and had experience with through their lifetime.

Also intertwined within the piece is a strand set in England, where Anna (Aoife Kennan) has agreed to defend Soldier F as his lawyer, the only alleged participant in the massacre of civil rights protesters in Derry in 1972 to go on trial. Her story creates family conflict within her marriage as she fights for her first big case though it also merges with her personal family ties, which has stark similarities to the storm brewing back in Niamh's home. It's not till later on though in Niamh's story, where she meets Melanie (Kate Reid) at a bus stop, that the full extent of both of their lives following a trip to the clinic becomes apparent; the core of the production is held together by these two strangers who have just met and decide to open their hearts to one another, and it's scene in which is so beautifully layered in the writing that it will stand out due to its simplicity and honest portrayal of two women suffering the same pain but through polar opposite romantic situations.

Overall, The 4th Country tells a story that the majority of us British audiences would be unfamiliar with due to other political situations taking over the media. It's heartbreaking in ways that are unimaginable to phantom where real lives were being affected at the forefront in recent times, and Kate Reid's writing is infectious in opening our eyes to what would have been, and to many possibly still will be, a dangerous time in many lives within Northern Ireland.